Dichotomy
by valbino
Summary: AU. ItaSasu in the most messed up way possible. An exploration of the border between love and hate; the line, when it is crossed, and what happens after. Rated for language and a certain level of fridge horror, though YMMV as always. Darkfic. Complete.
1. The Decision

AN: NO, the healer through which I am exposition-ing is NOT Sakura.

I will warn you, manga spoilers abound in this fic. Not always obvious, but I'm drawing most of my characterization from recent stuff.

Story beta'd by missmocha77 (thanks bunches)

000

I – The Decision

Itachi Uchiha quietly sat on the cot in his cell within the confines of the Konoha prison. He had had a chakra suppressing drug injected into his system at regular intervals. He was handcuffed to his bed. His meals were brought to him because he was considered insane, too dangerous to be around any of the others. If there were others. Without chakra running in his system properly, he could not activate the Sharingan. Without the Sharingan, he could not see.

He was also afflicted with some strange illness. The medics that had examined him and suspected it might be genetic, although the symptoms were not in line with anything they were familiar with. Itachi already knew he was ill. They asked him if he was taking medication, he supplied the names, and he was medicated. That was all they could do without further permission, and their best were working on recently returned shinobi, keeping those people alive. Not Itachi. He was not bitter, however. He had already resigned himself to being stripped of his semen, interrogated, and executed.

Konoha wanted the Uchiha line to continue, the information he knew, and for him to be another tally against the enemy. Perhaps they would not want his seed; they would debate among themselves whether or not the Uchiha massacre was caused by some err in Itachi's creation, some code that made him go insane. Itachi knew that his sanity was as intact as it could be, given the circumstances. He knew the truth, but nobody else wished to know. Itachi was not the least bit troubled. He had already decided that such things were not worthy of the anxiety normal people assigned to them.

000

One of the healers assigned to Itachi was puzzled by the young man's passive attitude toward everything involving his capture. She had heard that he let himself be captured, simply held out his hands and allowed the ANBU to bind his wrists with chakra-suppressing cuffs. She had noted that up close, Itachi was not intimidating in the least. He was thin, pale, with long hair and the lean musculature of a long-range fighter. She had, of course, heard of the skill the Uchiha used in battle, how easily he could have killed the ANBU squad.

The man that had always placidly sat on the edge of his bed, staring dreamily into the wall, was he so dangerous? She wasn't sure. She didn't want to talk with the other healers about it. They would mock her for being new to the team, would say that the craziest were always the ones you didn't suspect. At the same time, though, there was Sasuke Uchiha. He had a mean streak, rage to spare, and had been under intense care ever since he had been brought back from Orochimaru's grasp.

The younger Uchiha had been displaying severe reactions, breaking a glass of water offered to him one day. The healer recalled that she had been interned for a couple of days with one of the older people on the team, then moved to Itachi. Itachi was not as dangerous as the other, she had been told. She stopped in the little cafeteria for the staff to get some tea on the way to another check-up on Itachi.

One of the walls was mirrored, and she noted her tired eyes. She was always working round-the-clock with other subjects, not just the Uchiha boy. She strode quickly down the halls when she finished her tea, yanking on latex gloves. Itachi's cell was high-security; the guards gave her employee ID a look-over, and opened the metallic door for her.

Out of her pocket came the chakra-suppressing injection, contained in a syringe with a sterilized hypodermic needle. She talked idly to him as she went through the routine examination, not expecting a reply when she asked him what he thought of this or that, what his favorite color or weather was. Much to her surprise, he did answer her inquiry as to his favorite food.

"Anything sweet, cabbage and rice balls with seaweed," he murmured. There might have been a brief twitch of his lips, a small nostalgic smile.

"Hm. Didn't expect someone like _you_ to like sweets," she said, smiling amusedly down at him. "Go figure, huh?"

Itachi stared blankly at one corner of the small room. "Yeah," he whispered.

000

Sasuke did not know what was happening to him. He would alternate between being unable to sleep and waking up in the middle of the night, sweat pouring from his body. Then one morning, Sakura, bright and smiling, green eyes twinkling with some joyous emotion, had given him a glass of water. A simple glass of water. For a wild moment, Sasuke thought it was poisoned and flung it away, breaking it on the whitewashed wall a few feet to Sakura's right. Then the horrified look she gave him, the trembling of her lips. He had awkwardly muttered an apology as she cleaned up the mess. It had only been water. Similar outbursts kept happening, and Sasuke felt himself slipping away from reality even as he reaffirmed himself within it.

Then there was the argument with Naruto. It had been over something petty, probably ramen, knowing that cheeky blonde idiot. Suddenly, Sasuke's hands acted of their own accord and began to choke Naruto. It was then, he thought, that he was put here, wherever that was. There had been some healer girl starting an internship at the beginning, but she was gone now. Pity. He had liked her; she was actually kind to him. Each day he was injected with a chakra-suppressing serum, each day he was subjected to medical tests.

The healer girl, she always apologized for jabbing the needle into his thigh too roughly, or hitting a nerve somehow. Sasuke nodded in acknowledgement of the mistake and stoically endured through the pain and numbness. Then she had been replaced by a man easily twice her weight, with light brown hair. Sasuke had attempted to attack him without thinking, and suddenly he was tossed back into his bed like a rag doll.

Then there were other people that came and went. Sasuke began to drift when he was supposed to be paying attention to another ranting "healer." His room was slowly purged of any sharp objects. It was then that he had it figured out. They were treating him like he was insane but not telling him their diagnosis. He began to pay attention.

Nobody would pull one over on him.


	2. The Breaking

AN: Putting as much research into PTSD as I can without it coming off as a research book. Also drawing from my own experiences with anxiety. GAD and all that wot wot.

000

II - The Breaking

Itachi allowed the healers to prod and poke at him with their instruments, still trying to figure out why he was still in the cell and not on his way to execution. Then a guard came in and murmured something in the head healer's-a woman in her forties, with deep green eyes and the sharpness of a sword-ear. She nodded and allowed the guard to free Itachi from his bed. The guard, a newly christened jonin, quickly cuffed Itachi's hands back together. The Uchiha went silently. The healer girl, plain with brown hair, bit her lip in her nervousness. His nearly blind eyes watched her until she blended in with the others.

He was led down several turns, unsure of where he was at. That was alright; he would not need to know, if his logic was sound. He tripped once. The side of his face scraped painfully along the brick wall. None of the guards-at the very least, jonin level-bothered to do anything except pull him to a standing position. Itachi's cheek was scraped badly, glistening bright red in the fluorescent lights. He could feel the blood start to drip along his jaw. It hurt, but there were worse things to come.

Itachi knew what constituted a typical Konoha execution. He had observed a few during his brief tenure in ANBU. The person marked was brought into the room, photographs were taken. Then their information was recorded. They were offered a last statement, a priest of their religion. And then they were hypnotized by a member of the police force, by the Sharingan; it was supposedly painless after that. You felt nothing. Perhaps Konoha had changed since then.

Soon he was brought to a familiar place, the interrogation room. It had not changed since his ANBU days. The manacles around his wrists were unlocked and removed, and Itachi was directed to sit in a chair. The first thing he did was reach up and touch his stinging face. His fingertips came away red. Something cool and wet pressed against his face; he inhaled sharply at the pain it brought. No sound came out of his mouth.

A moment later, Ibiki Morino strode into the small room and loudly shut the door behind him. He wore his typical long coat and head-covering forehead protector. There was a glance, a look. It was almost undetectable. Itachi did not notice it. He sat in the uncomfortable wooden chair, slouched forward, hands dangling between his thighs. He looked very ill. Dark circles had formed under his eyes.

Then Ibiki spoke: "I remember you."

Itachi flinched at the volume of the interrogator's voice.

"So I guess you finally got caught. How many did it take? Ten men, twenty?"

"I went willingly," the Uchiha whispered. "Otherwise we would not be having this conversation." The harsh light glinted off his dark eyes.

"Care to speak up for the tape?"

Itachi repeated his previous statement. He did not raise his voice very much.

"Why did you let yourself be captured?"

"I did not see any point in doing otherwise."

There was that look again, in Ibiki's eyes. Itachi saw that time, barely. That look said, "You were a good kid. What happened?" For a moment, Itachi entertained telling the man. At this point in the game such a thing would be useless, and would only seed more questions.

"Heh. I know people like you, think you're better than everyone. You're not. You're nothing without those eyes. Right now, you couldn't cast a fucking fireball."

"Right now." There was the hard glint in Itachi's eyes again. The light caught a fleck of brown. Whatever was left of that famous Will of Fire was in that little spot of color.

"Don't get smart with me. The Hokage decided to let you off pretty damn light. As long as your statement matches the files she dug up, you aren't getting the execution order. I'd say the world would be better off without shit like you."

Itachi glanced down at his hands. Sometimes he had four, sometimes three, sometimes two. They were pale smudges against the dark floor. His fingers seemed shorter than they were supposed to be, but the Akatsuki manicure had not quite chipped off yet. Soon, then, Sasuke would come dancing through the door with a big grin on his face, a stick of dango to offer to his big brother. Then Itachi would wake up. Surely.

"Get a move on. Once we get this out of the way, you'll be briefed on the specifics of your sentence."

Itachi leaned as close to the recording device as he could from his position and whispered into it. His eyes were closed, lips barely moving; his unbound hair slid from his shoulders and covered his face. A few minutes later, he resumed his previous position, hair still partially obscuring his face. The scrape on his cheek was scabbed over by that point. Ibiki had disappeared, but a quartet of guards replaced him, putting the manacles around his wrists, forcibly wrenching him from the chair. The hallway was eons long, and the next stop was a simple wooden door.

000

Eventually, Sasuke figured it out. They thought he was suffering from PTSD, whatever the hell that meant. These people, they did not understand that he was probably fine, would be fine, if they left him alone. He told them so, several times. Once the proper healers were done with him, he was carted off to a different room. Naruto dropped by when he found out. The blonde was dressed for battle, casually mentioning that he was about to go on a mission with Sakura and Kakashi. During Sasuke's tenure in the hospital, Konoha had furnished the missing space in Team Seven with someone else, some ex-ANBU called Sai.

"So, idiot, what are you doing here? You should be going out on your mission," Sasuke said after an uncomfortable silence.

"I wanted to say that I forgive you for choking me, you bastard." Naruto grinned.

A smirk briefly alighted on Sasuke's face. "I'm not sorry, though."

"Heh, should have known." Naruto's expression sobered up. "What are you in here for, anyway? You're not hurt. Just weird."

The Uchiha shrugged. "They're telling me I've got something wrong in my head. I haven't noticed."

"Oh. Like, a brain tumor?"

"_No,_ you idiot!" Sasuke's anger was suddenly at its limit. His hands gripped the arms of the chair he was sitting in with white knuckles.

"Then...what? I don't get it."

"Ask Sakura."

"Eh? I came here to talk to you, though."

"Just—just go, Naruto."

The blonde's blue eyes seemed hurt. "Fine, Sasuke. You owe me an explanation when I get back."

"Whatever."

Naruto left, slamming the door shut. Sasuke felt very alone all of a sudden. He was in a private room with barred windows. The sky was gray. A part of him expected Kakashi to zoom by with his perverse little book. It was only one in the afternoon; no point in trying to sleep now. His bed was on the opposite end of the room. He had been allowed to freely roam his room as soon as they determined he had no physical ailments.

He looked up at the clock again, hoping that time might have sped up and it was suddenly six O'clock in the evening, and now he could eat his supper. There was the call button on the wall that he could use. But for the sake of companionship? That was not proper use of his resources. Perhaps he would request that books be brought to him. Strategy, mystery stories. That was something he could stand.

Books would not argue with him. They could not, for they had no brains, no mouths. Books calmed him down. He liked books. There was only one piece of literature in the room, if it could be called that, sitting on the one table. It was a newsletter from Konoha Hospital. He picked it up and skimmed through it, then flung it into the trash bin nearby.

Before he could throw himself back into his chair, a smiling woman—not the healer girl—with black hair and glasses entered his room. She nodded her head in greeting, then introduced herself.

"Hello, Sasuke-san. My name is Mi—"

"What the hell are you doing here?"

"—zuki. I will be your personal therapist."

"I don't need a therapist. Get out."

"I'm afraid I cannot. If I did that, I would not be doing my job properly. You're stuck with me for the next few hours." Mizuki smiled again.

Sasuke panicked. Shit. They thought he needed a therapist. He was fine, just a bit temperamental.

The woman continued. "I would like to start off by saying that you have been exhibiting symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Do you know what that is?"

Sasuke sat down on the chair. Hard. Mizuki took that as a cue to go on. "It's what can happen after a mentally traumatizing event, or events. When you were eight, you were exposed to a dangerous genjutsu, called Tsukuyomi. You were also exposed to the sight of several dead bodies at that same time period. Later on, at the age of twelve, the great Sannin Orochimaru used a strange sealing jutsu on you. Now, at the age of sixteen, you have been recently returned from this Sannin's lair. Don't tell me there can't possibly be anything wrong with the inside of your mind. Don't tell me that you don't need any help."

It was a slap in Sasuke's face, to have his entire life laid out in front of him in a clinical description. He sat there, trembling with rage, hate, every emotion those memories brought up. Itachi's face sprung immediately to his mind, and betrayal was added to the emotions roiling through him.

"I imagine you're wondering how I know this. It's my job. The Lady Hokage gave me top-secret files on you to augment my knowledge of you. I'm specialized in treating things like this, Sasuke-san. I'm only here to help you," Mizuki said, softly, "if you would let me."

"I don't need you, or anybody to tell me what my problems are," he snarled. "Get. Out."

"I'm also a special jonin. Do not underestimate me." Mizuki lifted one of her arms, showing the forehead protector with the Leaf symbol etched into it. "I think it will do you some good to write down all your feelings in a journal," she said, abruptly changing tone. A small notebook and pen appeared in her hands and were put on the table. "And I am going to stay here to make sure you do so, even if it takes all night."


	3. The Pursuit

AN: Itachi's weird characterization was brought to my attention, so this would technically be justifying that.

000

III – The Pursuit

_And there he was, sitting on a writhing throne of snakes. I could not breathe. I could not move. The snakes, green and white, the snakes, they began to wrap around me. They brought me closer to him, and his yellow eyes pierced into mine. I tried to get enough air to shout, but my mouth was soon covered. Orochimaru's tongue slid out from between his lips and lightly caressed what little of my face was exposed. Then he suddenly became his true snake form, a white and grotesque conglomerate of smaller snakes. _

Sasuke woke up in a cold sweat. He glanced around the quiet room in panic, heart threatening to beat through his sternum. Blood roared in his ears. Then he sank back into the mattress, realizing that it had been a nightmare. Reflexively, he attempted to activate Sharingan to get a better glimpse of his room, but then he remembered that the chakra-suppressor was still cycling through his system. He resigned himself to staring up at the white ceiling.

The room was cold; goose pimples formed on Sasuke's skin despite the heavy sheets covering him. He knew he would not get anymore sleep, so he threw them off and lightly leapt to the equally cold tile floor; might as well do a bit of taijutsu exercises. Briefly, he wondered why he had not thought of it sooner. He comfortably sank into the thrusts and parries, the rhythm of his feet slapping the floor, doing complicated acrobatics.

He continued until he was so tired that he could barely pull himself into bed. His face was partially buried in the pillow, but he did not care. Soon he fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

000

"Are you _sure_ that's what he said?" Tsunade glared up at one of the many special jonin assigned to Intelligence. "We can't make any mistakes."

"Y-yeah. Here's the tape and transcript. It's sort of peculiar, if you ask me. He...he was not coherent," the jonin said, placing the articles on her desk.

"How so?" The Hokage raised one blonde eyebrow.

"Well...he...I dunno how to explain, Hokage-sama. He talked like someone on heavy drugs."

"Damn it!" she muttered. "He probably is on heavy drugs, come to think of it."

"What do you mean?"

"I have an idea. Come back in a couple of hours. You're dismissed for now."

He saluted, and was gone in a puff of smoke.

Tsunade riffled through the stacks of paper on her desk until she came across Itachi Uchiha's file. She opened it and flipped the pages until she came across the medical records, including the medical surveys from the prison staff. She skimmed through anything previous to the Uchiha Massacre; that was not what she was looking for. There it was. The head healer's brief, precise notes would be of great use to Tsunade; while she was not quite at Tsunade's or Shizune's skill level, she was still very good, and Tsunade trusted her insight.

_Symptoms: coughing blood, pallor, chest and abdominal pain, back aches, vomiting, difficulty breathing, low grade fever, dark circles under eyes (uncertain what is due to medications)_

_Diagnosis: possibly genetic, but symptoms are more in line with Tuberculosis or other related conditions._

Tsunade noted the list of medications. Several strong painkillers, one of which was a narcotic, and even a steroid. She stood up from her chair and grabbed a medical book from one of her bookcases and flipped through it, looking for the side effects of all the listed drugs. Common ones were nausea, vomiting, drowsiness. Another possible side effect, from the book, was vertigo. Loss of appetite was a universal trait of many medications, so she added that to the growing list.

She pulled another thick book from her shelves and thumbed to the article on Tuberculosis, and also looked at related conditions. All of them could be treated with a strong regimen of antibiotics, it appeared. Which brought up a serious question: Was Itachi so drug-addled that he did not realize what was going on in his own body? Tsunade frowned at the book, deep in thought. Something had to be done. The drugs listed probably were doing more harm than good. He needed a strong antibiotic regiment, for at least six months, using conventional medication. Shizune or herself would be able to quickly clean his system of any ailments in a few days, but he could have been taking drugs for so long that withdrawal might set in.

Despite the horror stories stemming from the Uchiha massacre, and Sasuke Uchiha's current condition, Tsunade was willing to bet that Itachi, if the records were correct, was fundamentally messed up in the head, but was perfectly willing to repent for his actions. Given the right environment, of course. She amended that thought, knowing that betting on it would probably cause something catastrophic to happen, with her luck.

She pulled several other books from her shelves and carried them over to the desk, cross-referencing them. She mentally noted side effects, dosage recommendations, and withdrawal symptoms, along with what the drugs were typically used for. She decided that the narcotic was probably the most unnecessary of the drugs, or at least the most powerful. Narcotics were addictive. The dosage notated on his file indicated that he had been using it for several months.

Without a more concrete diagnosis, it was difficult to say if the steroid was helping at all. Tsunade would need to examine Itachi herself, it seemed. But definitely work on taking him off the narcotic, and at least one or two of the more harmful painkillers, she decided. She grabbed her notepad and scribbled some of her theories down and called the jonin back in.

He saluted.

She didn't bother greeting him. "I need to be taken to wherever Itachi Uchiha is being held at the present."

"Wh-why?"

"He's going to kill himself."

"That's...bad?" The jonin raised an eyebrow.

"It doesn't matter. Take me there. Now."

000

The jonin escorted her to the Konoha prison, then handed her off to a member of ANBU. Tsunade was led down several corridors, and eventually they stopped at a guarded cell; it was not the one Itachi had been held in before. The ANBU guarding the cell visibly started at the Hokage's appearance.

"I need access to this cell, immediately."

"Tsunade-sama...do you think that is a good idea?" one of them piped up. Her voice sounded vaguely familiar.

"I'm the Hokage." Tsunade's brown eyes glared up at the impassive white masks. "I outrank you."

After a few seconds, the metal door was opened, and Tsunade stepped inside. Itachi Uchiha was sitting on the bed and picking at his midday meal with a plastic spoon, clearly uninterested. He glanced up, nodded in greeting.

"Why are you here?" he murmured.

"I hope you are aware that you're killing yourself."

He glanced back at his food and placed it to the side. Tsunade's hand began to glow green. "You're being taken off the narcotic and steroid, and I'm going to put you on heavy antibiotics. I am also going to confirm the head healer's diagnosis."

"Where is Sasuke?" he asked.

"Why do _you_ want to know?"

Itachi was silent. Tsunade walked over and placed her glowing hand on his sternum for a second, and moved to his stomach. He did not move or protest.

Tsunade spoke again. "Yeah, it's tuberculosis. How long have you been taking medication?"

"Six months."

"I'm going to get rid of some of the damage done to your lungs so you don't die on me. Were you aware of the effects of narcotics?"

"I didn't care."

Tsunade was silent, simply concentrating on reversing the damage that had been done with her chakra. It was delicate, working on lungs, making sure the bronchial tubes healed correctly. She reduced the infection as quickly as she could without doing more damage.

After several minutes of work, she glanced at Itachi's eyes. The Head was right; very dark circles. "How are your eyes?"

He stiffened.

"That bad already? I guess that's what you get for keeping Sharingan constantly activated." Tsunade narrowed her eyes.

"Where is Sasuke?" he asked again. "I would like to know."

"He tried to strangle his best friend. He's under observation for PTSD right now."

Itachi looked thoughtful.

"By the way, I was wondering how you got your _pretty_ face all scratched up."

"...I fell."

"That was probably the drugs you insist on taking. A few of them can cause dizziness. Nearly all of them cause nausea and vomiting and drowsiness."

"I don't care," he repeated.

"By the way, I expect you to give a more coherent statement when we get the narcotic out of your system. Include Akatsuki's plans this time."


	4. The Tempest

AN: When the summary says "eventual" that means "The author is probably asexual and doesn't give a rat's ass what you find boring" (kidding, partially. I really am asexual.)

The next chapter deals with Itachi.

Remember, Valbino is now on Twitter...as Valbino! What a shocker!(but in all seriousness, I've had a twitter since...uh...forever?)

000

IV: The Tempest

Mizuki burst into the room with a small leather case the next day. There was a strange spark in her dark eyes that reminded Sasuke of Orochimaru. He tried to control his budding anxiety, at the same time completely frustrated with himself. He had better self control than this, didn't he? He was an Uchiha. Uchihas were the paragons of discipline and self control.

She did not say anything, just a simple hello. She set her case on the table and opened it, sorting through the many papers within. Eventually she brought out a simple rectangle of paper, totally blank on the side visible to Sasuke. He could see the silhouette of whatever was printed on the other side. She placed it on the table face-down.

"Turn it over," Mizuki said, slipping out of the room when Sasuke bent down to pick it up.

He flipped it over. It was a photograph of Itachi, probably taken when he was a member of ANBU. His eyes were dark, their natural brown. Sasuke crumpled it in his hand. He couldn't breathe; he felt like he had been slammed in the gut and the wind knocked out of him. Why would Mizuki do this? She even left the room.

Without thinking, Sasuke activated Sharingan, shaking. Suddenly he was seven years old again, and staring at Itachi's retreating back, and wondering why his brother wouldn't train with him even one time. The photograph was ripped to shreds. Itachi was killing their parents. The paper drifted to the floor. Sasuke cast a fireball jutsu and turned the shreds of paper into ash; the tile floor had a burn mark, but was otherwise unharmed. So the chakra suppressor didn't last more than a few hours; he had been given round the clock injections previously.

Mizuki slipped back into the room with one eyebrow raised. "I was expecting a slightly less...violent reaction."

"You took me off the chakra suppressor."

She nodded. "Yes. I figure if we're going to get you in a position to deal with your PTSD, some trust is in order. I trust you not to attack me, you trust me not to drug you. Fair?"

He considered this for a few seconds. "I hope you aren't going to pull anything like that again."

"I don't think I will for awhile." She pushed her glasses further up her nose. "Deal or no deal?"

"...Deal," Sasuke said. "Why did you show me that?"

"To gauge your reaction time and find a starting point."

"I thought that was the stupid writing exercise." Sasuke deactivated the Sharingan and frowned.

"No, not really. I didn't look at what you wrote; actually, I destroyed it. Was it helpful at all?"

"No."

"Alrighty then. What do you like to do?" she asked, black eyes staring at him keenly.

"Train. Take walks."

"That's it?"

"Yeah?" It was Sasuke's turn to raise an eyebrow.

"Do you think training would help you deal with your current mental state?"

He was quiet, mentally turning it over in his head. "I think so."

"Now we're getting somewhere. Although, I will warn you, you're going to eventually have to learn how to deal with it properly. You can't find a log to punch every time you feel upset."

"I know."

Mizuki pulled a file folder out of her case and skimmed through it. Her fingernails were long and painted red. She hummed idly as she read.

"So, Mizuki."

"No Mizuki-san?"

"Mizuki. Why were you assigned to me?"

"I know some of your family," she said, giving Sasuke a wary look. "They were sometimes a bit...odd, but not bad."

"You mean Itachi, don't you?" he spat out.

"I mean your parents." Mizuki's glasses slid down her nose a fraction. "I am privy to certain facts. Such facts don't really concern you at this moment. Let's deal with your current frame of mind."

"What about Itachi?"

"He's not entirely sane. You are my concern at the moment, though."

Sasuke's nostrils flared, but he did not give any other indication of his frustration.

"Let's take a walk. Fresh air will probably do you some good," she said. "I already cleared it with security."

000

Sasuke dug his hands into the pockets of the scrubs he had been forced to wear as deeply as the pockets went. He had asked Mizuki if he was allowed to stop by his apartment and pick up his clothes. She had cocked an eyebrow and nodded. They walked mostly though the older, narrower streets. Mizuki noticed that as he walked, the tension in his posture lessened.

The pair achieved an uneasy coexistence as they walked under the trees. Periodically, Sasuke would activate Sharingan, making sure it was still working, to be certain of Mizuki's honesty. She glanced up at the trees, remembering the one time she had visited her acquaintances. The Uchihas.

She had met Sasuke when he was only a toddler; he probably didn't remember her at all. She had recently become a jonin. Mikoto Uchiha, upon hearing the news, invited Mizuki over to their home for a little celebration. Itachi had been there, only an eight-year-old. Barely a genin. Itachi was a quiet, polite, pleasant boy, only speaking when spoken to.

_He had read in the corner during Mizuki's stay, with little Sasuke on his lap. Sasuke was getting in the way of his reading, but Itachi paid no mind, simply moving his little book whenever Sasuke obstructed his view_. _Mizuki asked if she could hold Sasuke for a bit, and Itachi hesitated before passing the little boy over to her. She gently sat him on her lap and stroked his soft hair. _

"_Ah, Mizuki-chan, what are you going into exactly?" Mikoto asked. "I know you mentioned medicine."_

"_Oh, yes. I'm going to work with Ibiki Morino, I believe, in psychological research." _

"_How fascinating!"_

"_Hm. Do you have any further ambitions?" Fugaku Uchiha had asked. His mouth was in a perpetual frown._

"_I would like to help victims of psychological trauma if I am able to," she said, with a shy smile. Sasuke made a burble of joy when Itachi picked him up again._

"_What do you mean by that?" Itachi asked, with a guilty glance toward his parents._

"_Well, say...if someone sees another person get hurt, they might need me to help getting over that, or just someone to talk to. I'm not much of a fighter." She grinned._

"_Grow out your hair and get different glasses," Itachi said, with the wide eyes of someone trying to be innocent. "People will want to talk to you more."_

_Mizuki touched her jaw-length hair self-consciously, and her very large, very round glasses slid down her nose a bit. Mikoto scolded Itachi in a low hiss, telling him to be more polite. Fugaku raised an eyebrow and almost seemed to approve of the comment._

"_Heh. Out of the mouths of babes, huh?" Mikoto said. Her cheeks were flushed with embarrassment. "Itachi, what did I tell you to say?"_

"_I'm sorry, Mizuki-san." He glanced down at Sasuke's downy head._

"_It's alright, Itachi-kun. I'm not mad. I don't usually give a whole lot of thought to my appearance." She took her glasses off and couldn't tell one Uchiha from another. "Any better?"_

"_Yeah. You have pretty eyes, Mizuki-san." Itachi smiled shyly up at her from his seat on the floor. "They're really dark."_

"_I can't see, though, so I'll have to put these back on." Mizuki smiled and replaced her glasses._

_Soon after, they shared parting words and Mizuki left, to see her peers in the big jonin exam celebration. _

Mizuki sighed and looked at Sasuke. He was heading stolidly to the small apartment he had mentioned before. It wasn't a part of the Uchiha complex, that much she knew. It was a good thing. Keeping him in that place would simply be asking for him to go on a rampage; being near things that reminded one of the traumas they encountered tended to exacerbate the symptoms of PTSD. Perhaps once he improved enough to function outside of the realm of his private room in the mental ward without supervision.

Sasuke nodded at her as he stepped into his home. He returned with a bag full of clothing, which he tossed into her arms.

"I didn't put any weapons in there. A deal's a deal. You can check anyway."

Mizuki let Sasuke walk ahead of her before using one hand to shuffle through his clothes. He had been honest. There were no weapons. Not even a single senbon. She decided to trust him more often, if a second opportunity arose.


	5. The Dream

AN: Oh, look, something that isn't just me demonstrating that I researched medical stuff! But not really. x)

V – The Dream

Itachi was moved to a high security room on the top floor of the hospital; Tsunade wanted him away from the infirmary in the prison to maximize her supervision of his recovery. Almost immediately he was put on a weaker opiate than the codeine he had been taking before. Tsunade lowered the painkiller dosage as much as she safely could.

He was put on a regimen of the common antibiotics used to treat Tuberculosis. Tsunade almost wanted to simply cut off the supply of opiates from Itachi's system, but reconsidered when the withdrawal symptoms on top of his illness might be more than he could handle. There was still valuable information to be extracted.

Itachi's bed was next to the window; the window had a latticework of iron covering it on the inside, although he could still see through, all the way to the Konoha park. He could see all the people milling about, although he could not parse more than that. The trees were green and brown blotches surrounding and encompassing the village. If he squinted, he could pick out whether a tree was deciduous or evergreen. A spattering of pink indicated the perennially blooming cherry blossoms.

He closed his eyes. They burned. Tsunade was standing at the side of his bed when he opened them again. She shoved a needle into his forearm, attached to an intravenous drip.

A soft beeping emitted from the monitor on its stand. A few wires were attached to his inner arm with patches, then secured further with tape.

Tsunade injected something into the IV drip, perhaps morphine or one of the many antibiotics she listed off. Then he was forced to swallow some pills, and she stalked out of the room. Not a single word had been uttered. The door to his room was left open.

Occasionally, someone in a white coat would walk by, not even glancing at him. Then a woman with black hair pulled into a bun, black eyes, and pale skin walked into the room. She adjusted her glasses as she came in. The door swung shut behind her with a soft click of the lock. She looked somewhat familiar, although Itachi could not place from where.

"Hello. My name is Mizuki Udori." Her hands were casually resting in the pockets of her white lab coat. "I'm not supposed to be here, but I have a few questions for you."

"Do I know you?" Itachi asked.

"No, not really," she said. Her glasses slid down her nose a fraction. Her voice was also familiar.

"Do you know me?"

Itachi murmured something to himself almost inaudibly. Mizuki edged closer to his bed. Her hands remained in her pockets.

"We met once," she said.

"How so?" His mind was still trying to connect the pieces together through the haze of the drugs. He felt drowsy; the pills he had taken were beginning to take effect.

"It doesn't matter. I want some sort of answer from you."

"To what?" he asked, faintly. He allowed his head to collide with the pile of pillows.

"Why did you really come back?" Her eyes glittered like hard coal; more than anger rested below the surface. "The recording of your statement...I don't think you were thinking clearly."

He struggled to keep his eyelids up, but nevertheless looked at her, trying to discover the intent behind her question. "My statement...it illustrated why...quite well..." he whispered, before allowing unconsciousness to overtake him.

Mizuki frowned down at him, and pushed her glasses up her nose. She strode out of the room and broke the genjutsu she had placed on the guards. They woke up with a start, but she was already out of sight.

000

_This time, Sasuke's chidori does not miss, and white melts into the world of Tsukuyomi. Now he stares up at me, repeating my name. Father and Mother's blood have splattered onto the walls of our home, painting them red. I show him all that I have done, and then he casts a Great Fireball jutsu, and the orange flames become Father._

_Father tells me that I have been neglecting my duties. He tells me that if I want to be the head of the clan, then I must not be so disrespectful. The sting of his slap caused me to flinch. I do not like being told what I do and do not want. Father bends down to my height and I cannot look away from him. The tomoe in his Sharingan rotate almost lazily. He grabs my shoulder and his fingertips dig into my flesh. I know what is coming next. My seven-year-old self cannot break his hold._

_The stars clear from my head and Mother offers a hand to help me up. She smiles sadly and tells me through clenched teeth that he only wants the best from me. My vision blurs over._

_I am standing next to Kisame. Sasuke is once again charging at me with his chidori. I catch his wrist, break it. I swallow the nausea that the noise caused. Chidori dies slowly and the jutsu's incessant noise is quieted. I am reminded of the simpler, happier, time. Sasuke is against the wall, and I am holding him up by the throat, and telling him to hate me. _

_Then the scene takes an unexpected turn. Sasuke grabs my necklace; he breaks it. The three charms on it make bright bell-like noises as they hit the floor. _

_Now I am the one trapped in Amaterasu. I am forced to relive killing Mother and Father again and again by Madara. He changes the illusion and kills Sasuke, too. An unbidden scream rips from my throat, hoarse and feeble, and I realize that he had ended the illusion. He stands over me, holding my head up with a fistful of my hair. _

_Their faces blend into each other._ _Madara becomes Sasuke. _

Itachi woke up. He gasped for breath. His sheets were damp with sweat. The gasping turned into coughing. Droplets of blood splattered onto the palm of his hand. They contained more color than the rest of his dark room.

When had he begun to think of it as _his_ room?

Fleetingly, a pang of nostalgia struck. It was not his room. His room was in his parents' house in the Uchiha compound. It was a small cozy place stacked with books and other items of interest; it was his sanctuary. At least, it had been.

He wiped his hand on the sheet. The moonlight illuminated the streak of red. Itachi closed his eyes against it, and turned over to face the darkness. Something tore away from his arm with a prick; the monitor screamed its beeping alarm.

Two women walked into the room. They prodded a new IV needle into his arm and made him sit in the chair next to the bed as they changed the sheets. Itachi stared out the window, watching the ink-colored sky. The pale streak of moonlight cutting across the room was made an obsolete source of light when one of the nurses flipped the light switch. It made an audible click. Itachi squinted, trying to will away the brightness; he was cajoled back into the bed and the fluorescent brightness disappeared with the nurses.

000

_Father and Mother's blood is splattered on my feet. I can't scream. I can't move. They die again and again, and Itachi forces me to watch. I am covered in blood. I can't move. Itachi tells me to hate him. No. Itachi...My brother...He could not have done this. His eyes, bloodshot, release me from their trap. I fall out of Tsukuyomi and into my room in Orochimaru's lair._

_The snake himself glides in. The door which I had not noticed before shuts and locks itself automatically. Orochimaru's hand reaches out and pulls my face toward his._

_"Mine. Your eyes are mine," he whispers._

_I struggle to escape, but a green snake, longer than I am tall, coils around me. Now I scream, hoarsely. My voice does not work. A crow flies in and kills the snake, and carries me up, up, up, until we are on a mountain's peak. I can see Konoha. I look back at the crow and the crow has become Itachi. He is naked, with parts of his body scraped and bleeding. My cheeks are hot and wet with sweat and tears._

_Itachi's eyes are blank red, with no Sharingan to behold. His fingertips lightly touch my forehead. I cannot breathe._

_"Forgive me, Sasuke."_

_He transforms into a crow, gasping and writhing grotesquely. I raise a katana from the ground in curiosity. The crow squawks and flings itself into the bright blade._


	6. Blame

AN: Yeah, yeah, whatever, the pacing of this fic is slow.

Mizuki's glasses are a sort of radar to whether or not she is feeling a strong emotion, haha. Couldn't resist throwing it into her characterization.

Thus begins part two.

VI – Blame

Sasuke walked through the streets of Konoha. He saw flowers, mostly roses, in bloom, and wrinkled his nose at the heavy scent.

It had been one month.

Twice a week, he was forced into visiting Mizuki Udori, a medic-nin specializing in mental disorders (once, she told him that they nicknamed her the "ninja therapist"), in her small office in the mental ward of the Konoha Hospital. He was slowly improving, she said. Sasuke still knew almost nothing of her, only what she told him. It seemed odd that she and his family were once friends; Mizuki had mentioned once that she was a month older than Ibiki, and that they hated each other.

Allegedly Ibiki lost his temper while they were working together, and had been transferred over to the intelligence division. At the very least, it explained the difference in their careers.

Sasuke paused at the entrance to the hospital. He felt a vague unease simmering in the back of his mind, unsure why. He shrugged and entered, going down the halls to the mental ward. As he approached, he hear Mizuki's voice drift into his ears. Another voice, nervous and pitched up, followed. Soon after, a familiar healer girl walked toward him.

"Hey," he said, not expecting a response.

"O—Oh! Hello!" She smiled, warm brown eyes twinkling. "It's nice to see you feeling better."

"Hm."

She briskly walked off, pausing to turn and wave at him. Sasuke shrugged. He walked into Mizuki's small waiting room; it was empty. The young man at the reception desk chirruped a greeting and waved him in.

Mizuki's office was in a state of chaos: she was kneeling on the carpet, muttering to herself about lost files, boxes were strewn about, and her white coat was draped over a chair. She stood up in a hurry once she noticed him.

"Sorry about that. I got promoted to department head a few hours ago. Cleaning house." She wiped sweat off her forehead and adjusted her outfit, a black mid-thigh length dress with a red sash. There was mesh armor underneath it. She also had black leggings on, typical of a kunoichi. "Uh...have a seat somewhere. I'm sorry. I thought you were going to come earlier...or later..."

Sasuke lifted her coat off the 'patient' chair and let it drop to the floor. He sat down.

"So, how are you feeling?" she asked, sitting in the chair behind her desk. "I hope you aren't punching logs anymore."

"I feel the same."

"You've been doing better, you know. Describe it. I have some ideas for our next session."

"...Dreams. Always the same," he muttered, concentrating on a model of the human brain; it was a kitschy thing, brightly colored. Distracting. "He turns into a crow and kills himself on my sword."

"You should have mentioned it sooner. So, who is 'he'?"

Sasuke took a deep breath and swallowed. "Itachi."

"I see. Why would he kill himself on your sword?"

"How the _hell_ am I supposed to know?" he yelled, gripping the arms of the chair like iron. A crease appeared between his eyebrows.

"You have no clue." Mizuki exhaled sharply. "Hm."

"What do you mean?"

"It's none of your business for now. I believe it's time we worked on more than this armchair 'tell me how you feel' business. That's not my job."

"Hm."

"Now, then. Remember this?"

Mizuki produced from the piles of paper on her desk a photograph of Itachi. Sasuke's breathing quickened, his sclera threatened to overwhelm his eyes, his hands balled into fists. He did not create a fireball and destroy it.

"So we've made some progress. Let's see what happens here..."

She pulled out a photograph—grainy, grayscale, but quite familiar—of Orochimaru. Sasuke swallowed. He started a cold sweat. He couldn't breathe.

"We've made a _lot_ of progress, then." She raised an eyebrow and casually dropped the photos back onto the desk. Abruptly, she stood up. "Let's go to the cafeteria."

000

Mizuki opted to take the stairs to the ground floor and the longer route to the cafeteria, simply to give Sasuke more time to calm down. He was definitely dealing with the triggers better, although complete desensitization would be impossible. The best she could hope for was to give him the ability to cope with his anger and anxiety being triggered.

She had told the healer to befriend Itachi Uchiha. The Hokage wanted information; perhaps if the girl got close enough to him, he would say something important, and she would report back to Mizuki, who would send it to Tsunade. In theory. More than likely, Itachi was now a drugged invalid and anything useful would not be said until after he was fully recovered.

Mizuki arrived at the cafeteria first; she heard Sasuke scuffing his feet behind her. They entered and sat at a table near the door. In the far corner of the loud, busy room, she noticed someone sitting quite alone. Nobody seemed to notice. The person had long black hair, an IV stand next to them, and was wearing a dark colored robe; they were very thin, and the face was obscured by the curtain of hair. Mizuki's glasses fell down her nose a bit.

"Why'd you bring me here?" Sasuke asked. "It's noisy."

"You'll have to learn how to deal with noise, in and out of your head."

"I have." He hunched in on himself, almost petulantly.

"Something undid everything you built up around yourself. I believe it was your time spent with Orochimaru," Mizuki said, leaning forward conspiratorially. "which, while in a way inconsequential compared to the Uchiha massacre, you were not prepared for."

She glanced at the dark-haired person again. There was the healer, doing her job. So Itachi _was_ up and about. He must be recovering much faster than estimated.

"What are you looking at?" Sasuke asked.

"Turn around."

Sasuke glanced behind him, shrugged, and opened his mouth to reply. He paused and turned around again. There was the healer girl. She was tending to a thin man with dark hair. The distinctive creases that were extensions of his tear ducts, the thin dark brows. It was Itachi. She was _smiling._ Sasuke visibly paled. He didn't move.

"So now you know. What are you going to do about it, Sasuke?"

"...Nothing," he spat.

"No. You can walk away from here, stay at this table, or go talk with him. There's always a choice."

"Then I'll see you next week," he muttered, and stormed out of the cafeteria.

Mizuki's glasses nearly fell off. She frowned at Sasuke's retreating figure; she had overestimated him somewhat. With a shrug, she headed back to her office.

000

The healer began to take over the duties of a nurse; normally, she would be working with shinobi and kunoichi to heal their wounds with chakra. This was a special case, Miss Udori had said when the files were handed over. She had worked with the elder Uchiha before, and might easily be the only person he would trust at this point in time.

She decided to speed his recovery along, administering small amounts of chakra-healing with each dosage of medicine. If her estimation was correct, he would be almost fully recovered within four months. The more quickly he recovered, the more quickly Konoha would get their information, and the more quickly justice could be done. She had just been promoted to medic-nin, only eighteen, too young to really remember the Uchiha massacre.

It was still hard to believe he would have done it. He was soft-spoken and polite to her—albeit occasionally incoherent. He had mentioned that he enjoyed reading once. She brought a few novels with her the next day. He liked to look at trees. He liked to think. There was no monster inside Itachi, she decided, a few days later. Only a man. A ruined man.

She decided to tell him her name. He nodded and gave her his, out of common courtesy. She began to tell him what she liked: sunsets, gazing at the stars, and watching artists paint. They dabbled around acquaintanceship, but neither were willing to divulge more than what a file on them might say.


	7. Shut

AN: I know some of the bits in ch6 weren't totally realistic, but come on, how am I supposed to make the plot happen? Magical fairy sparkles?

Haha, this chapter is one of the reasons it is "_drama_" rather than "angst" or "hurt/comfort".

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

VII – Shut

Mizuki sat at her desk in her office. Her fingers were massaging her temples. She released a frustrated growl from her throat and slammed her fist onto the desk.

"Where did I go wrong...?" she muttered, angrily reading through Sasuke's file again. "What did I miss?"

A glance at the window stopped her from furthering the tantrum. The sun was setting, painting the sky a bright orange. She should go home. Sasuke would show up next week, and there would be no further ventures outside the office. She would apologize, and everything would be back to routine again.

But she had gotten so close. The answer, the key to reaching to the young Uchiha was but a millimeter away from her fingertips, and he had taken it away at the least opportune moment. Maddening.

She resignedly pulled on her coat, collected her keys, and headed home.

000

Itachi stared up at the ceiling from his bed. _The_ bed. He knew Sasuke was still sequestered within the walls of Konoha, at least for the time being; the healer, a girl a few years younger than he, had told him as much. When asked of the chances of arranging a meeting, she had grown silent. She had bitten at her lip and glanced around nervously and whispered that she would ask her superior later.

She had lied to him. Itachi did not fault her for it; he was a wanted criminal. Tuberculosis was contagious, he had been told later. Of course, all those who came in contact with him were probably vaccinated against the condition, or he had been on medication long enough for the condition to be considered unthreatening. It was likely the latter, as he was occasionally brought down to the cafeteria.

The light from the window indicated it was nearing evening; therefore, somebody should have already brought him his midday meal. The medications caused a distinct loss of appetite, although he made himself eat anyway.

His suspicions were confirmed when Sasuke burst into the room and held a kunai to his throat. Sharingan burned into Itachi's eyes. He closed them on reflex.

Sasuke hesitated. It would not be a fair fight, not even a fight at all. The kunai was stowed away in his weapon pouch. He stared at Itachi's face, saw the dark circles under his eyes, a nearly invisible scar on one cheek.

Without warning, Itachi brought one knee up and connected it with Sasuke's stomach, taking advantage of the lull. The younger Uchiha fell into the metal guard on the side of the bed. It would bruise later. Immediately after, Itachi's right hand grasped the collar of Sasuke's shirt with far more strength than expected.

"Do you want answers? Everybody wants answers."

"No."

"Hm." Itachi let go of Sasuke's collar, only to use his other hand to pull the boy to his other side. "If I were to throw you with this hand, the IV needle would be removed, and the nurses would rush in at the alarm."

Sasuke's eyes widened, and the Sharingan transitioned back to his natural dark gray eyes. He swallowed. What was being siphoned into Itachi's blood stream with that IV? He did not have the chance to ponder. Itachi's foot caught Sasuke's ankle and removed any leverage the boy had.

"You did not come here to kill me, nor did you come here to gain answers. Why are you here?" the older Uchiha whispered breathily.

"I don't have to tell you," Sasuke muttered, reactivating Sharingan.

"Do not underestimate your enemy."

"You should be dead."

Itachi simply let Sasuke retreat to the far corner, suppressing a coughing fit.

"Why won't you die? You want to, don't you?" Sasuke spat.

"Kill me, then," he murmured. A thin line of blood and saliva was dripping from his lips.

Sasuke's brow furrowed at the sight of blood.

He left.

000

Sasuke returned to his small apartment with his head whirling. He had had the perfect opportunity and wasted it on the notion of having a fair fight with Itachi; such a notion must be Naruto's influence. And Itachi had still outmatched him, despite the exertion.

He showered, allowing the torridly hot water to reach nearly scalding levels of heat. Some distant part of him was in pain from it, and he absently turned a knob on the tap to _cold. _Strangely, the sudden change in temperature was welcome. What had come over him, to possess him of the notion that Itachi should not have died an hour ago?

He swallowed dryly. The water felt too cold. He was shaking. He tried to turn the tap the other direction, and gasped as it became scalding hot. His hands clenched into fists. A curse flew from his mouth.

Itachi's face returned to his mind. The eyes. Brown-black and bloodshot. The hollowness of his cheekbones. Despite the hot rage that bubbled up when Itachi's name crossed his mind, Sasuke was mildly curious. Itachi would not have been captured if he didn't want to be. Then it dawned on him.

Itachi wanted _Sasuke. _Sasuke was prohibited from leaving Konoha. Solution: turn himself in. But on the other hand, something else must have fallen in place to avoid being killed on the spot. Itachi had something that Konoha wanted; information. Information was the key.

Sasuke leaned against the shower wall, anger rising a bit. Until Itachi was coherent enough to disclose properly every single thing he knew that Konoha did not, he would still live. It didn't all add up. He was coherent enough to have come up with such a plan, but not quite so much to implement it?

"Damn it," he muttered. Whenever they thought him up to the task of informing, there went Sasuke's chance for proper retribution.

_000_

_The sky weeps. Water splashes over me. A bolt of lightning flickers through the clouds. I look down. My feet are covered in mud. Strangely, the fact that I am naked does not bother me. There is a shallow cut across my stomach; it is bleeding. My eyes are bleeding, too. My fingers tremble as I reach up to touch my cheeks._

_I smear blood on my thigh, suddenly feeling unclean. Sasuke appears, riding the back of a great white serpent with the face of a demon. Orochimaru. The snake slithers toward me. I understand the tainted feeling and shove my katana through Orochimaru's skull. The snake is dead. _

_Still my brother does not recognize me. He sits upon the dead snake, mourning its loss. Mangekyo Sharingan flickers on at the same moment recognition strikes. Sasuke charges toward me, invites me into his illusions, and I welcome the torture with open arms._

_Father dies again and again, and I cannot stop my blade in time. Sasuke appears within the torture and drags his nails through the cut on my stomach, rakes them like claws through everything he can see, touch, over my face. The pain is like rapture, and still Father will die._

_Now I am released from the genjutsu. Sasuke's eyes are black again. They are glittering coals, willing to alight at the slightest spark. I remain silent. _

"_You lied."_

_I cannot answer._

"_I know you lied. You said that I was not worthy." _

_Sasuke strides closer; I can see that one of his eyes is bloodshot. He kicks my ribs. "You're pathetic."_

_As he walks away I fall back into the realm of darkness._


	8. Sleep

AN: You can follow me on Twitter! Link in my profile! :)

VIII - Sleep

One week had passed since the strange confrontation between brothers. Sasuke once again sat in Mizuki's office, as was becoming routine. He decided not to mention the meeting between he and Itachi. It was on the illegal side of things. Of course, he had his suspicions about Mizuki. It was no accident that she timed their visit to the cafeteria that way.

She glanced up from her paperwork; her eyes were red-rimmed, probably from stress. Her glasses were crooked. "Hello, Sasuke."

"Hm."

"Apologies, once again. Every time I get promoted, a new stack of papers sprouts from my desk...there we go," she muttered. "Now. I think, based on previous encounters...we'll have to get you used to the idea of talking with Itachi."

"What?"

"We're going to do a role-playing exercise."

"...You can't be serious."

"Actually, I am. It's my job to make sure you don't get a glimpse of a pale guy with dark hair and snap. Until you can learn to cope with minimal effort, you'll stay in Konoha." Mizuki's dark eyes reminded him of a hawk. "I would assume you've been training your ass off with your spare time."

"What the hell else am I supposed to do?"

Sasuke glowered at her. She was standing between him and freedom. The woman smiled enigmatically. "Well, then. I don't have to tell you that you've already spoken to Itachi. Security cameras are not affected by genjutsu.

"Furthermore, if you're going to cast a genjutsu on the guards, for God's sake, don't make it a sleeping genjutsu. Then it's painfully obvious you snuck in. You're lucky that you're so important to the village. Otherwise, you'd be in prison."

The Uchiha was silent. Then, with a light smirk, he said, "You know this from...experience?"

"That's not the point." A hesitation. "I used a concealment jutsu."

Sasuke shifted in his seat. Before he could reply, Mizuki started talking again.

"Alright. I want you to pretend that I am somebody important to you. Then, you would tell me, while still pretending, what you would tell them. I can use a transformation jutsu if you think it would help.

"However, there is a risk that you might attack me, or try something that would make us both uncomfortable. I am willing to take that risk."

"This is stupid," Sasuke muttered.

"Do you have any other ideas? Perhaps we could take you to the archives and you can read all the top-secret files pertaining to your case? Waltz into Itachi's room and kill him?"

"You're the therapist. You figure it out," he said flippantly, staring fixedly at his feet. His arms were crossed.

Mizuki frowned and sighed. "Well. We could also, if you are willing, cast a genjutsu on you that would make you believe that you were fighting Itachi or Orochimaru. If I feel that you could hurt yourself or myself, I will release it. It is entirely up to you, though."

"How'd you be able to cast a genjutsu on me?"

"Take a chakra-suppressing drug. The one I have in mind would wear off within six hours. Either way, it's entirely up to you."

"Those are my only options."

"I could come up with something else, but for now, yes. I believe it's time we became more rigorous."

"I'll take the chakra suppressor." Sasuke darted a suspicious glance her way. He seemed to hunch in on himself.

The thought occurred to Mizuki that if he had a very developed sense of his own chakra, he could manage to keep it out of his system. No. He was a fighter. His medical knowledge was enough for first aid in the middle of battle, no more.

"Alright. After I get all that I need, I want you to follow me."

000

They walked to a room ensconced in the back of a waiting room. It was small and dimly lit, furnished with an upholstered chaise, a single end table, and an office chair. Mizuki told Sasuke to sit on the chaise; she handed him a glass of water and a red pill.

At his questioning glance, she said: "It's the chakra-suppressing drug. If I were to use a serum, such as the one used when you were first brought here, the effect would last much longer due to the more concentrated dose."

Sasuke swallowed the pill and gulped the water down. "Now what?"

"It's better if you lay down and relax for a few minutes while it kicks in. I'll have you hooked up to some monitors. Safety precautions."

He hesitantly did as she said. "What sort of genjutsu are you planning on?"

As she took his blood pressure and placed the various adherent pads that attached to her monitoring equipment, she talked. "I was about to ask you what you were comfortable with, but on the other hand, I believe we could start with Orochimaru. We haven't touched base on him as much as we should have." She wrote something down on a notepad. "Or would you rather see your mother?"

"Do what you want. It's only a genjutsu," Sasuke snapped.

"I want you to have a say in it." A hesitation. "I would like to apologize for the incident in the cafeteria again. That was not very kind of me."

"Just do it."

Mizuki sighed. "Once I cast it, it could be very difficult for me to control it, which is why I've got the monitors. Be warned: I'm no Yamanaka. If I could have gotten even Ino, that would have been a great help." She fell silent and began to slowly, deliberately form an intricate set of hand seals.

And then he was no longer in the room.

000

Itachi squinted up at the clock on the wall. It seemed that his vision was getting worse. Perhaps it was all the chemicals coursing through his circulatory system. He once read that if a person was on a chakra-suppressor for more than a few days, then they would suffer from severe fatigue, vertigo, nausea—typical symptoms of prolonged lack of chakra; on the flip side, there was also a small chance of blood clots, the inability to utilize one's chakra, and muscular atrophy, among other things. It had been almost two months.

Perhaps the drugs had changed since his teens. That was likely. He glanced at the monitor with its soft beeping in time with his heart beat. Would he hold out long enough for Sasuke?

"Maybe," he whispered to himself.

With sudden disgust he threw the sheet off himself. It might be too late before Sasuke figures it out. Painful, congested coughing burst forth from his quick movement. Less blood than before; the notion ran afoul of his plan. He needed to die. Konoha would probably execute him anyway, but they had a few reasons to keep him alive.

He could easily be bait for Akatsuki, a trap to fall into. Barring that, a master of mind-related ninjutsu could place a seal and make him obedient, and he would be a weapon again, a sort of misguided form of karma.

His thoughts turned back to Sasuke. The hate, he had expected, bred into the boy. Sasuke's hesitation was also expected. Sasuke would always hesitate, would always look for an alternative. But the glint of shock in his eyes did not fit the rest of the picture. Whatever Sasuke saw had also caused him to deactivate the Sharingan.

Itachi regretted neglecting his health. It had made him sluggish, reckless. Tsunade had been correct to reduce the dosages. His vague, sudden plan was salvageable now; he doubted that Kisame would try to enact a search. The Akatsuki would not be able to turn up any official records of his remaining alive. It was falling into place.

000

Mizuki carefully monitored Sasuke's vital signs. His heart rate was nearing one hundred; blood pressure high. His eyes fluttered open and shut a few times, something normal when she used this method. Abruptly, he sat up. That was her cue to dispel it.

He blinked. "What the hell was that?"

"I created a basic setting and your mind filled in the blanks. The results are generally more dramatic than simple henge-based role playing. You probably feel a bit disoriented right now. It'll pass."

After a few seconds, Sasuke leaned back, using his arms to support his weight. His eyes were half-closed, lips parted slightly.

"That was not what I expected," he managed to mutter.

Mizuki flipped open her notepad. "I need to know what you expected to happen. Then tell me what happened."

"I figured it would be similar to guided imagery, with the genjutsu being the platform for me to kill Orochimaru."

"It's similar, but not quite guided imagery. Is that all?"

"Yeah."

"What sort of differences did you notice between your expectation and what happened?"

"Well? I don't know. Similar, but ... " Sasuke's eyebrows drew together and he stared at the whitewashed wall. "Shit. It's not supposed to be sexual."

"Why would it be sexual?"

"I don't fucking know. You tell me."

"_How_ was it sexual, then?"

The younger Uchiha hesitated. He seemed to be struggling with some fundamental part of the whole ordeal. He finally muttered something about snakes and touching. Mizuki jotted down a note about sexual overtones, and closed her notebook.

"Alright. We'll discuss this next time around." She removed all the monitoring equipment from his body. "You reacted more favorably than I hoped."

Without so much as a wave, Sasuke stormed from the room.


	9. Skin

AN: Link to twitter in profile, will contain valuable and not so valuable insights into my writing process and news on my life. Lul.

Oh, and I couldn't figure out a good way to put it, but Sasuke is hiding his chakra presence as much as possible near the end of this chapter. And it's short but I feel it's better to end it there so I can go to chapter ten on an even better platform.

IX – Skin

Naruto had taken Sasuke to Ichiraku's when he got back from his most recent mission on impulse. Sure, Sasuke wasn't the happiest guy in the world, but he had managed to bruise and scrape himself up during training. That was a sign of something serious going on. More than usual, anyway.

He was hurling shuriken at a training post with pure rage when Naruto arrived. The blonde had been hoping to spar, but not when Sasuke was like this. When Sasuke had calmed down enough, Naruto dragged him to his favorite ramen bar.

And there he sat, barely touching the steaming noodles. Finally, the dark-haired boy muttered, "Why did you bring me here?"

"Well, I was hoping to find out what pissed you off so much."

"Oh."

"...So, what pissed you off?"

"One of the exercises...you know, the counseling stuff."

"Ohh. What did he do?"

"_She._ And she cast some kind of genjutsu on me. I don't want to talk about it." He pointedly dug into his ramen.

"Eh. Whatever. Just don't kill anyone." After a moment of silence, Naruto's mind locked onto another thing Sasuke had mentioned. "_She_? Is she a babe?"

The ramen dropped out of Sasuke's chopsticks as he was putting it into his mouth. "_What?"_

"_Iiiis_ she?" He leaned closer to the Uchiha, putting an arm around him conspiratorially.

"Why does it matter?"

"Hey, hey. Just wondering."

"Get off."

Naruto obliged. "You gonna finish that?"

"Yeah." Once more Sasuke attempted to eat his rapidly-cooling ramen.

They ate in companionable silence for awhile, but Naruto finished his bowl first and softly, deliberately spoke.

"But seriously, Sasuke...your therapist or whatever isn't the only person you can trust. You've got me, and Sakura, and Kakashi-sensei." He paused, making sure his team mate was listening. "If you don't want to, you can talk it out with yourself. Whatever's bugging you. Pissing you off."

Sasuke stared at his bruised hands and contemplated telling Naruto exactly what was bothering him. The way that Orochimaru had manifested during that genjutsu, how it bled into his nightmares, every detail.

Then Sakura showed up. She rattled off something inane about his appearance, then ordered a bowl of noodles. The moment had been ruined.

000

"I told you already; don't get attached to him," Tsunade muttered.

"He's the son of one of my mentors. It's my job to protect him. I owe Mikoto that much," Mizuki said. Her voice was calm, even. Black eyes glimmered with defiance.

"Either way, your technique may have caused damage to his already imbalanced psyche."

"No. It merely exposed what was already present. I am not responsible for the content in Sasuke's mind."

"Your report indicates that Sasuke might have been sexually abused at some point. Have you done a follow-up examination yet?" The blonde woman tapped the folder with her index finger.

"No. We still have a session later this week. I felt that we should wait a few days in order to allow this to sink into his mind. I trust him not to do anything reckless."

The hokage's office was rife with tension. Mizuki's black hair was unbound and pooled around her shoulders. She restlessly ran a hand through it. Tsunade might put another person on Sasuke's case. A person who would not understand the Uchiha, would be grasping at straws.

"If you trust him, Udori, you can keep the case. I'll assign you an assistant to help around your office." It went unspoken that the assistant would be present with all of Mizuki's patients at their appointments.

"Thank you, Hokage-sama." Mizuki stood and bowed.

The healer girl nodded to Mizuki in greeting as she walked out. The hokage beckoned her inside.

When the door closed, the healer immediately jumped into her weekly report on Itachi.

Tsunade stopped her tirade with an uplifted hand. "How soon, would you say, might he be fully recovered?"

"I...don't know if I'm an authority on that, Hokage-sama."

"Based on your reports, there's something off about how quickly Itachi is recuperating, don't you think?"

The girl raised a confused eyebrow. "How so?"

"Well, the first two or three weeks, before you were assigned to him, he was barely able to walk in a straight line. Then a month afterward, he could take a supervised visit to the cafeteria. What's the link between these two events?" A sly smile curved her lips. "You are one of very few people allowed near him."

The blonde simply looked up at her, with that implacable half-smile in place. "If I'm correct in this logic, then perhaps you have been using chakra healing. Your intentions may be noble, but this means that I will have to alter the dosages." She pinched the bridge of her nose. "This is going to be a pain."

"I'm sorry," the healer said. "I wasn't sure..."

"This will be a warning, then. Don't mess with a doctor's instructions." After a pause: "What exactly did you apply chakra to?"

"Very simple things. Pain relief, a bit of immune system enhancing. I don't have a lot of chakra," she murmured, dipping her head in embarrassment.

"So _that's_ why you're a healer. Hm. Give me the file." At the girl's hesitation, she added, "Dismissed."

000

Sasuke clung to the underside of the hospital roof's overhang. He had discovered recently this very useful security blind spot. He could hear what transpired – sometimes see – in Itachi's room. At that moment, the hokage's voice sharply made it's point.

"I think it's better to take you off it." She paused, expecting an answer, but getting none. "Even with the altered dosage, it's going to take a toll on you."

Itachi's murmur did not carry through the window, a mishmash of vocal sounds.

"...Sasuke?"

"Why is Sasuke so important?"

Tsunade's feet came into view from Sasuke's vantage point. "He can still be saved."

"Why save me, then? I'm a dead man no matter what happens," Itachi said in a bitter tone.

"Officially, you still have information on Akatsuki."

"Unofficially?"

"I've read your files. There's not a whole lot that can be done for you..." She stepped up to the window, and Sasuke held his breath. "...from a purely political standpoint. Medically, there's no reason that you aren't able to make a full recovery."

She turned around. "And there's still the issue of Sasuke."

"What about him?"

"What you did to him. How could you?" A fierce anger lashed out from beneath her no-nonsense tone.

"I had no choice," he muttered.

"You don't feel guilty? Not at all?"

"I had no choice." His voice was fainter.

Sasuke lost his grip on the overhang and fell, but reached out and used chakra to cling to the wall. He half-ran, half-fell to the ground. The sun was too bright all of a sudden, the air too hot. Cold sweat formed between his shoulder blades. Sasuke sat there, absorbing all that he observed.

Blades of grass so green they could slice through his eyes. A dandelion's seeds catching sunlight. Tree bark that began to look like a war-torn landscape. He couldn't bring himself to move, to go to his dim apartment.

His world had been thrown off its axis.


	10. Blame, part 2

AN: Did you know that I absolutely adore writing Itachi?

This was the hardest chapter to write thus far. And, yes, I finally revealed what the healer girl's name is. She's also the closest thing to an antagonistic force this story has. *shrug*

Unsubtle hint: you should totally, like, follow me on twitter or something.

Enjoy! : )

X – Blame, part 2

The room was dimly lit. A monitor beeped in one corner, and the blinds had been closed on the window. Sasuke was briefly struck with the idea that he was stepping into an opium den; the chairs started to morph into burgundy-colored piles of tasseled cushions and thin trails of smoke wafted through the room. A pair of glowing red eyes materialized from the corner with the monitor, a corner that seemed to be miles away. There was no window. And the glowing eyes beckoned to him with promises of sunlit days spent among the tall grass of the Uchiha Compound, promises of fulfilling every want and need Sasuke ever had.

"Walking into my trap like always, foolish little brother." The genjutsu dispersed and the light was flipped on by Mizuki.

"Apologies, but I would prefer it if we conducted this in proper lighting," she said to Itachi, whose eyes were averted from the light.

Sasuke froze in the doorway. This was the same room in which he had been subject to Mizuki's genjutsu. Gone was the chaise, and in its place were two chairs. Itachi was seated in one of them; behind him was an IV drip. Mizuki had begun to speak, mostly about the guards posted just outside the door and even near the window, the security camera, and that she would personally oversee the meeting.

A pervasive sense of discomfort filled the room. Sasuke took the other chair hesitantly. Mizuki pushed a small table with several manila folders on it between them.

"The point of this meeting is to begin to come full circle. If either of you makes a move to harm the other—physically—then I will intervene. If either of you are at a loss, peruse the items on the table. You might be surprised." She promptly stepped into a newly fabricated shadow.

With his normal abilities back in gear—the renewed flow of chakra through his body was like an old muscle to be stretched—Itachi could garner the results he wanted. Needed. What had first been a move of drug-induced desperation had become the springboard needed to enact justice upon himself. There was no longer a chance of leaving Konoha, that much was certain.

"Why?" Sasuke asked, finally.

Instead of the anger and hate Itachi expected, it was a subdued, almost strangled murmur. Dark eyes stared at him, bright points of light within. Was there anything he could say to justify it? It would be easier to simply lay bare all the facts, strip them of mystique, of emotion.

Sasuke's eyes...they were still a child's eyes. Just a little boy wanting his parents back, small white hands gripping the door frame. Color drained from his face, a face full of fear and anger and disbelief and inexplicably _love._

Itachi found he could not separate his actions from the motivations and remained quiet. The Sharingan bled out and his eyes were their usual brown. Sasuke became a blur of black, white, and blue. Flecks of red accompanied soon after.

"Didn't you hear me?" Sasuke stood up. Itachi tensed almost imperceptibly.

"Yes. I did."

"Give me a _goddamn_ explanation," Sasuke said, with clenched fists.

"What do you want me to say? That I enjoyed it? Killing every single one of them?"

The quiet intensity of Itachi's voice was different than his usual aloof tone. Sasuke had found a chink in his brother's armor. Now he abused that little weakness for every single word Itachi could say, albeit subconsciously.

"Did you? Did you fucking enjoy it?" Sasuke's knuckles were white; his head was bowed.

"No," Itachi murmured at last.

"How?"

A glint of steel appeared in the elder one's eyes, then they bled into the Sharingan. "It was easy. I simply took my katana—" He gestured a chopping motion with his right hand. "—until no more stood."

"..._Bastard,_" Sasuke spat.

"I was just a soldier carrying out an assignment." Itachi's expression remained aloof, but his gaze was to the floor.

"That's how you justify it?" Hot tears flooded the younger Uchiha's face. He was shaking.

"That's how everybody else justified it. Why not me?" Itachi's eyes were sharp. "Tell me."

"Nobody can justify that. No one!"

"What would you have done? There was no way out. No escape," he murmured.

"You couldn't just run away?"

"They would have sent somebody else. Somebody more thorough."

Itachi's gaze slid up and down Sasuke's body. Head to toe and back. The implications were very clear to Sasuke all of a sudden. Another person would have killed everyone, even Sasuke. Even Itachi. There was a surge of some indeterminate feeling in his gut.

"That's not the whole answer though. You and I and Mizuki know it isn't."

Itachi remained silent. Sasuke lurched forward to strike him, but Mizuki materialized from the corner to step between them.

"I think that is enough for today. Don't you?" Her demeanor was surprisingly determined to keep Sasuke from landing a blow.

He acquiesced just because of that.

000

The healer girl had been stuck with the job of cleaning Itachi's room with one of the other nurses. She felt that being put on 'bedpan duty' was not a part of her job description. It hadn't been at the prison, at least. She did not understand how she was supposed to cull information from him if he never talked. She didn't have any mind-affecting jutsu to call upon or truth serum. Through guile alone she was supposed to get under the skin of a powerful missing-nin who could kill her with a thought.

At that moment, she made a decision. It was much riskier than using chakra healing, but the risk was worth the outcome. She had a feeling that Itachi wanted to die anyway. He accepted the treatment passively, but a few times, when taking away his meal or replacing an IV bag, there was a bleak, hopeless look in his eyes.

Protocol be damned, Itachi Uchiha needed to die or finally confess to whatever the hell she wanted. He was a traitor and a criminal. He did not deserve to be in the same floor as people who were in greater need of intensive care than him. Sure, he was a twisted, broken man, but that was not an excuse in her book.

Perhaps Satsuki Araya didn't know the entire truth, and perhaps Satsuki Araya didn't want to know the entire truth. She wanted her old job back.


	11. Let's Take A Walk

AN: Whoa, I got another C2! Thank you very much, whoever added it! : )

Hmm. I felt we needed some more of Sasuke and Naruto being BROOOOS. Stepping up on the romance side of things I guess. :P It's like, two in the morning right now so forgive any weirdness.

Normally I won't do personal replies in the ANs but:

Winter Cicada – Thank you SO MUCH for all the kind reviews! I hope this chapter is more to your liking. I'm gonna definitely pick things up as much as I can without it devolving into "Sasuke felt aroused for some reason that was definitely NOT related to Itachi ..." (you get the picture). Much thanks again, and hope you keep reading. – Val.

XI – Let's Take A Walk

Itachi sat bolt upright in the bed. He had a very vague recollection of the dream he had had, but one image remained in his mind. It was Sasuke, bent over his bed as he laid there, reassuring him that everything would be alright. A bitter laugh caught in his throat.

If only.

Surprisingly, he had no desire to escape from Konoha Hospital, although in a few more days he would be able to do so with ease as his chakra recovered. There was the matter of Satsuki—the long-familiar healer girl—trying to cause his illness to relapse, her chakra aiming to weaken rather than bolster his immune system. Sharingan had been useful in determining her chakra levels.

It was clear that she was not on the same level as even the most humble of ninja, but she also had enough chakra to perform healing jutsu, and excellent control of what little she had. Her soft hands were a definite indication of civilian life. Perhaps she did not pass the final exam at the academy, then.

At this point in his recovery, it would be prudent to interrogate him, go through standard procedure. Tsunade's visits were infrequent; she was planning something, then. Stalling for time, perhaps. For Sasuke? It would be unsurprising. Itachi could not fathom what Sasuke had done to inspire such compassion, or if he had done anything at all.

Satsuki had mentioned that another meeting with Sasuke would be set up soon, within the next day. Her pretense of kindness did not fool him. Itachi immediately guessed that she was supposed to befriend him, perhaps to snag some intelligence when he let his guard down. That never happened.

He noticed when she switched his normal medication to simple sugar pills. That a person was working hard to be subtle about their loathing of him intrigued him, especially one so discontent with her duties. This meant she was keeping up a pretense to allay suspicions from her superiors.

His thoughts turned back to the dream. Surely Sasuke would not care for Itachi, not in such a doting manner. No. The remains of the little boy only saw an idol destroyed before his eyes, something rotten exposed beneath the golden exterior.

Itachi barely recalled it anymore, long buried beneath other things in his mind. He knew that if he had simply run away, another ANBU captain would have been given the job, and hunter-nin would be sent after him, and more people would have died. He knew he had thrown up afterward, and passed out, and threw up again upon coming to. He knew that he had wept as he vomited.

He knew that Sasuke was his only chance for redemption.

Giving up all he knew about Akatsuki to Konoha intelligence, all he knew about Madara Uchiha, would not be enough to stay a writ of execution, and though he could escape and work under-cover again...there would never be another chance like this. Never a better opportunity.

The next time Satsuki visited his room, he asked for a pen and notebook.

Sasuke opened his eyes to the ceiling of his apartment. It was cheap, white, with something done to give it a spiky, rough texture. If Naruto didn't quit getting on his back—almost literally, as the annoying blond was busy smacking at him with a pillow from above—he would have to do something drastic.

"What do you want?" he finally decided upon, as opposed to _I'll cut your testicles off if you keep doing that_ or _Please don't make me punch you_.

"We were supposed to train two freakin' hours ago!" Naruto pouted down at him. The pillow stopped moving. "You're turning into Kakashi-sensei!"

This brought a dry chuckle out of Sasuke.

"It's not funny. You're a total super bastard, you know that?"

"How'd you get my key?"

"Oh, Sakura-chan told me," Naruto said, totally unaware of the murderous vibes coming off his best friend. "It was—"

Sasuke slammed Naruto onto the bed. At least, as much as one could be slammed into a soft, downy mattress. "Don't ever do that again, or I'll..."

The blonde snorted derisively. "You can't kill me. They'll just stick you in prison for a couple of weeks and then you'll have to go to another therapist...you never did tell me if she was a babe, you know."

"I...guess she's attractive. She's out of your league, so don't even think about it," he snapped, seeing Naruto's contemplative expression. With great reluctance, he released Naruto from the stranglehold.

"Ooh, so she's in _your_ league?"

"No. Mizuki is like, thirty." Sasuke could not and refused to fathom why people like Naruto and Jiraiya were so into girls. At least, in that way. He knew he wasn't interested in boys either, so it didn't matter to him. It was all very annoying.

This information only encouraged Naruto, of course. "Even better."

Sasuke resisted the urge to flop back onto his pillow. This would be a long day.

It was only after he had come back in after a long day of training with his team did Sasuke get a message from Mizuki, handed out by a courier-nin who looked rather sour that she had been put on a cross-city mission. So there was going to be another meeting.

He had not realized it would be so soon. It was unlike Mizuki to rush into things...perhaps they would finally interrogate Itachi, but something crystallized in his head. He wanted to get to Itachi first, well before Ibiki so much as laid a thought on his elder brother.

When he arrived at the designated room for the meeting—it was the same as before, but better-lit—Itachi was not there. Sasuke decided to wait for Mizuki.

And almost immediately afterward, cursed his stupidity for believing the room was empty when he had plainly seen Itachi's Sharingan activated and had been under a genjutsu for a few seconds the last time.

"Let's take a walk in my world, foolish little brother."

x

The world of the Tsukuyomi was black, white, and red. This Sasuke was well aware of. He was not aware that it could be applied to other things besides...well, there really only was one phrase for it.

"Mind rape," he muttered underneath his breath.

"Not today." Itachi was in a simple yukata, not even a proper obi tied.

"Why did you bring me here?"

Itachi took slow, measured steps around him, not unlike a predator circling its prey. "I already told you."

"Fun world this is. Do you keep spare iron maidens here, too?"

"I see you have become prone to making jokes. That's not like you." Itachi's tone had changed a bit. Not tender, no. Curious.

"You pick things up from people."

"As always, you refuse to see what is in front of you. A fool."

Sasuke scoffed. "What, exactly? There's nothing that I haven't seen here."

"Come. I only want to walk." Itachi's thin fingers gestured at him.

Sasuke figured that since it was a genjutsu, and that since Itachi hadn't pulled one of his seventy-two-hour-long mind rape sessions yet, he doubted there was any point to do such a thing. So he followed.

The scenery around him was a jumble of familiar and unfamiliar things. There was their back yard, full of the tall gentle grass. It had been a place to train and play. The slow sway was comforting, but sinister in the bleak color scheme of Itachi's genjutsu world.

The next thing his eyes alighted on was the academy. It was empty, grimy. There was a single item in the school yard. A dull practice kunai, Sasuke noted. The handle was well worn from years of being handled by students. A target in the distance made him realize that this was one target that Itachi had missed. The only one. A relic of his first target practice.

"Why are you showing me this?" Sasuke dared to ask.

Before Itachi replied, he entered a sliding paper doorway, and now they were in their house. Their real house. Not a single drop of blood was on the floor. Everything, down to the tatami mats and the indoor slippers, was in place. Itachi's face was tinged over with bitterness and sadness. Suddenly he looked like the thirteen-year-old boy who had thrown up after his first ANBU mission.

Sasuke remembered that day. Mother had fretted over him. Father was mostly indifferent, claiming that he would get over it right as rain. Itachi was pale and sad, lips raw from the vomit. His eyes, normally a cool black-brown, were bright with tears and bloodshot. He remembered asking what was wrong, and Itachi mussed his hair, poked his forehead, and said he would understand in a few years, don't worry.

"I think you understand now, don't you?" Itachi murmured.

Sasuke couldn't take it anymore. He rushed forward to strike Itachi. His fist met thin air.

"You are in my world now." Itachi let go of his wrist. "It would be wise to refrain from attacking me."

Sasuke did not listen. He attacked Itachi again, pinned him against the wall.

"With a single thought, you would believe your death was imminent," he said.

"If you wanted to do that, why haven't you?"

"I don't believe in unnecessary conflict."

"Tell that to everyone you _fucking_ killed."

"You still don't understand."

Itachi disappeared again, putting Sasuke into a hold from behind that would break his neck if he moved the wrong way. Suddenly the genjutsu felt very real.

"If I had wanted to kill anybody, I would not have taken the assignment. I would have run off and allowed somebody to kill you and everybody else while I went on merrily slaughtering through the countryside. Is _that_ what you want?

"I told you to hate me, and you fail at even that. Did you put me on so high a pedestal that even now you dare to hope I am not beyond redemption? Did you think that I was not a cold, ruthless machine?"

Itachi's thumb brushed along the carotid artery, feeling the pulse there. Sasuke's skin crawled at the light touch, almost like the shock of a stunning lightning jutsu. Very softly, against the cusp of his ear, Itachi whispered.

"You were wrong."


	12. Hands Dabbled In Blood

**Sorry for the wait! I was super busy for the past 2 months and also had some writer's block! Hopefully this makes up for it somewhat! :) **

AN: Sasuke's dialogue has been, thus far, the second most challenging thing apart from pulling something sort of romance-y out of this story.

And oh shit, how did I manage to totally forget the whole "Curse Seal" thing? Let's just say it's already been dealt with and isn't totally relevant to this particular storyline, K?

(Full quote: "When liberty comes with hands dabbled in blood it is hard to shake hands with her." – Oscar Wilde)

Enjoy! :)

xxx

XII – Hands Dabbled in Blood

It took Sasuke two tries before he was able to activate Sharingan again. He saw how little chakra was flowing through Itachi's system, and was mildly confused. Tsukuyomi was a chakra-intensive technique, and past experience told him that Itachi would not use his Mangekyo techniques frivolously.

Mizuki pulled him to his feet and helped him walk out of the room. He flung his head as far as it would go to get a last glimpse of Itachi's chakra, and found Itachi's eyes burning into his with fervor.

x

_The oasis is a welcome reprieve from the expanse of sand. Its waters are clear and cool, as if compensating for the murky heat of the desert. Sasuke stands amid a cluster of ferns. His head is bowed, his hands limp at his sides._

_He attacks without warning, but I am used to improvisation. It is a small matter to counter him and pin him to the ground._

_I am staring down at him; he has fallen unconscious. His eyes snap open, and for a moment they look exactly as Mother's did before I killed her. Black as nigh. Wet doe eyes. Sad, pleading._

_I cannot strike him down._

_My katana hits the dirt and creates a cloud of dust; I bring Sasuke's forehead to my lips. True to his nature, he steals up my blade and shoves it through my chest._

x

(_two months later)_

Tsunade paused at the doorway to her office in Hokage Tower. The day was hot, unbearably hot, air thick with humidity; such was summer. She opened the door and glared down at the stack of paper on her desk before taking a resigned breath. In a few minutes, the report on Itachi was going to come. Satsuki was being more evasive, probably hiding something.

She didn't care anymore about the healer girl, she realized. No matter if Itachi was well or not, Konoha would get the information, and Itachi would die. All the classified files on him denoted a cruel, calculating killer. To Konoha, that was all Itachi would ever be.

x

Itachi wiped a mix of blood and sputum from his lips. His condition appeared to be worsening, as expected. That would give him some leverage with Sasuke. Tell me all your secrets before you die, tell me, tell me, his little brother would say. The sunlight caused the blood to look more grotesque, as if his hand was being eaten alive.

He studied it some more. A splash of bright red among yellow-brown gunk. It had come from his lungs. His body produced it. Again the feeling of utter disgust fell upon him, and he stood up to drag the IV drip stand with him to the restroom to wash his hands.

x

Sasuke struck out at the training post again and again with chakra augmented fists. A feint here, a jab there, vaulting to another place before slamming into it with a shin. Sakura watched, in awe of how his hands and lower legs were scraped up, of his incredible strength and stamina. But something bothered her about the way he moved.

His movements were jerky and uncontrolled. Sometimes he let out a sob as he attacked the splintery wood, as if he was unaware that he had an audience. She knew that something was eating at him, but he would never say what. Not even with a truth serum.

Suddenly he sat down on the dirt, panting and sweating. He licked split lips.

"I hate this," he was muttering. "I hate this."

Then he got up and walked home.

Sakura followed.

"Sasuke…? Is something wrong?"

He paused at the door to his apartment. How had she sneaked up on him? He frowned. "Why do you ask?"

"I saw you training."

"So?"

"I know you better than that." She crossed her arms over her chest and glanced to one side. "You're angry about something."

"And? You think I've got some dark secret?"

"Yeah. I—I mean, I know it's stupid, but…"

"You're right. It is stupid." He opened the door to his home. "Maybe it's time I told somebody. Come on in."

Sakura peered through the frame, then stepped gingerly over the threshold. Sasuke's apartment was clean, almost stark. There was one sofa, one table, one chair, and one rug in the front room. She glimpsed a kitchen tucked into one corner of the space, small and practical.

Eventually, she sat down on the edge of the sofa seat. Sasuke took up occupation in the chair.

"I've been going insane," he finally said.

"What? What makes you think that?"

He raked a hand through his hair. "Something's happened to me."

"You're going to have to be more specific." Talking to Sasuke was like pulling teeth.

"What has Tsunade told you?"

"About what, Sasuke?" Sakura suddenly felt the room grow smaller.

His eyes seemed to glance askance at everything before meeting hers. "Itachi."

"Why? Is he…has he…?" She stood up, hands moving through the air in an attempt to grasp at reason.

"He's on the top floor of the hospital. Intensive care unit." Sharingan flicked on and off involuntarily.

Sakura sat back down with a sigh. "So you've…met him?"

"Four times."

"And?"

"What the hell am I supposed to say?" Sasuke stood up and began pacing around the table.

"Just…tell me how you feel. Okay? I'm worried about you. We—Naruto, Kakashi, and I—are worried about you."

"I don't _know_!" he snarled. "And I don't want to know."

A hint of steel came into her green eyes. "I'm not leaving."

Sasuke activated Sharingan without thinking and was already moving to strike at Sakura. He stopped his fist right before it connected with her jaw. There was a graze of skin on skin, and his hand dropped to his side.

"It's been tearing circles in my mind." His voice was quiet, almost a whisper. "I can't sleep. I can barely eat. All I know is that I can't hate him, but I still…I…"

Another growl burst forth from his lips. He whipped his body around in an attempt to keep Sakura from seeing how his face contorted into a mask of rage. Hot tears dripped down his cheeks.

"I see," Sakura whispered.

Sasuke heard the click of the door behind him. Almost immediately following, he dashed to the bathroom, clicked the light on, and stared at his face in the mirror, Sharingan ablaze. There was the paleness of his skin, the long straight nose, sharp cheekbones, all things familiar to him about his face. He did not feel bad about thinking himself attractive, since many girls his age had told him so. But there was something dark and alien about the familiar visage now.

There was a dark shadow underneath each eye; with Sharingan activated, he looked startlingly similar to Itachi. A furrow rested between his eyebrows that had not been there the last time he looked. His lips seemed paler and thinner.

He reached out to touch the mirror. The glass was cool against his fingertips. Staring at his face, seeing the change there, something snapped inside him. A crack appeared in the glass. As he pressed on, another crack, then another, formed. Curious, he sent a burst of chakra through his fingertips.

The glass shattered in a great glimmering implosion. A thousand Sasukes fell to the floor. He spared a glance for his hand, noting the shards embedded there. Blood dripped into the sink.

As he scooped up the remains of the mirror, he wept.


	13. I'll Assemble my Equal

**AN:** You have no idea how long I've waited to finally get to this part of the story xD

Sorry for the shortness, but I've still got 2 more chapters to write. :)

Enjoy!

Chapter title comes from the song "A Wolf Descends Upon The Spanish Sahara" by Fair to Midland. Check it out sometime.

000

XIII – I'll Assemble My Equal

000

Itachi let the kunai hang there in his hand, almost delicately, like a piece of thread he was unwilling to tangle. The kunai dangled for a moment; then it was flung between Sasuke's eyes with more force than he had thought Itachi capable of. The clone disappeared in a puff of smoke, leaving five shuriken in its wake. Lazily, it seemed, Itachi fell backwards to the bed. The shuriken were embedded in the wall. Sasuke threw himself down—kunai poised to attack-from the ceiling into the bed with as much force as he could accrue, then yanked it out of the empty mattress to fling it behind him. His reward was a hiss of surprised pain, but the triumph was short-lived. Itachi slammed into him and twisted his left arm behind his back.

"Do not forget that you have not surpassed me," he whispered into Sasuke's ear.

And the world melted into an illusion that was almost as fearsome as Tsukuyomi. Sasuke tried to break it with Sharingan, but realized it would take more than that very quickly. He bit at his tongue until he tasted blood, until he had to spit it out, letting the pain carry him out of the genjutsu. The room snapped back into normalcy: Itachi's bed a few feet away from a barred window, IV drip in place, walls and ceiling matte white, floor tiled in pale blues. Sasuke saw that he and Itachi had yet to move a single inch from their positions. It had been a genjutsu battle.

Sasuke's knees buckled; he winced when they hit the floor. Blood dripped from the corner of his lips. Mizuki took his arm and dragged him over to a chair, frowning when he did not react to her touch.

"What did you do to him?" she growled, already concentrating her chakra to her hands.

"Nothing he would not have done to me." Itachi sat placidly in the bed. His hands were folded in his lap.

"If I had any say in the matter, you would have been shoved off to the prison hospital a long time ago," she finally said.

Sasuke pushed himself out of the chair with a grunt and staggered to the bed. Still Itachi did not move. They locked gazes; a heartbeat too late Mizuki realized they were again engaging in a genjutsu battle and Itachi would best him again. She moved to touch both of them, shoving her chakra into their systems. Sasuke was easily broken from it, but Itachi offered such strong resistance that it was nearly impossible to be rid of those last shreds of illusion. To be certain of the dispelling of the genjutsu, she performed a chakra release on herself.

Even when Itachi's illness had relapsed almost to the point of no return, he displayed impressive willpower. A silent cough often shook his body, but he gave no outward indication of discomfort otherwise. Mizuki thought better of her reluctance to have she and Sasuke immunized against Tuberculosis.

"Mizuki." Sasuke glanced pleadingly at her, finally wiping the blood dripping from his mouth. That look was the closest thing to apologizing she had ever gotten from him.

"I see." She shoved her hands into the pockets of her lab coat, using the movement to uncap a tranquilizer syringe she kept in one of them.

An ANBU agent burst into the room. "Mizuki Udori! You are needed at the Hokage Tower!"

"What?" The syringe was surreptitiously recapped and remained in her pocket.

"Lady Hokage wants every jonin to be there. Allegations of treason have been made." The man paused as he noticed the Uchiha brothers. "I will stay to guard these two."

"Huh. Well. I guess I'll be back in a bit." She turned, nodded to Sasuke, and slipped the syringe into his pocket. "Use this if you get desperate; it will still take thirty seconds to work, though," she whispered.

He raised an eyebrow. A few seconds after Mizuki's steps faded away the ANBU slumped to the floor, unconscious. Itachi had hidden his chakra signature and deactivated the Sharingan to seem harmless enough that the ANBU would let his guard down.

"What did she give you, Sasuke?" he murmured, Sharingan activated again.

Sasuke sneered, then tossed a kunai into the wall behind Itachi.

"You are a fool." But Itachi seemed bitter as he gripped the weapon, not quite pulling it from the wall.

He disappeared in the blink of an eye. Sasuke moved to form a seal of genjutsu release as he stabbed behind himself. Itachi shoved him onto the bed and straddled him in one flying leap, holding the kunai to his throat. His eyes, ringed in dark circles, darted around Sasuke's face. Sasuke felt the room grow small and hot when he sensed that some kind of barrier between them was growing thinner and thinner as Itachi's hot breath rushed over his skin. It was all he could do to gaze into that vermilion stare.

Their foreheads touched, sticky with sweat; a single droplet of the salty liquid splashed onto Sasuke's face. His mind was made up very quickly after that. A flick of the wrist and the syringe was being emptied into Itachi's bloodstream.

"Clever," Itachi whispered, something akin to a smirk fluttering over his face.

As the drug worked, Itachi's lips slid down Sasuke's cheek and rested next to his ear. "But you are still foolish."

Sasuke lay there, staring at the ceiling. After a moment of panic, he slid out from under the unconscious man and shoved chakra into the ANBU operative's body before leaving.

xx

_A tropical bird appears at my side. Its red plumage is the only color in the gray room. A black tuft of feathers flicks up from the top of its head. It pecks at my outstretched hand, drawing blood; it is painless._

He.

_He is Sasuke. _

_Sasuke becomes the boy Sasuke, and the boy cradles my hand in his, watching it bleed. A tear falls from his eye, onto the wound, and it heals instantly. His eyes widen in shock, and more tears fall, up my arm, into my eyes, and onto my naked bleeding chest. The pain disappears._

_And as he cups my face in his hands, tears flowing, I realize that I am dead._


	14. The Smile of Disaster

AN: I graduated high school so now I get to look forward to doing college stuff! Which isn't exciting.

For some reason, "A Wolf Descends Upon The Spanish Sahara" keeps inspiring chapter titles! ("It smiles like disaster/It looks like a trap/So go by the wayside/And never look back")

000

XIV – The Smile of Disaster

000

_Father and Mother's blood is splattered on my feet. I can't scream. They die again and again, and Itachi forces me to watch. I am covered in blood. I can't move. Itachi tells me to hate him. No. Itachi...My brother...He could not have done this. His eyes, bloodshot, release me from their trap. I fall out of Tsukuyomi and into my room in Orochimaru's lair._

_The snake himself glides in. The door which I had not noticed before shuts and locks itself automatically. Orochimaru's hand reaches out and pulls my face toward his._

_"Mine. Your eyes are mine," he whispers._

_I struggle to escape, but a green snake, longer than I am tall, coils around me. Now I scream, hoarsely. My voice does not work. A crow flies in and kills the snake, and carries me up, up, up, until we are on a mountain's peak. I can see Konoha. I look back at the crow and the crow has become Itachi. He is naked, with parts of his body scraped and bleeding. My cheeks are hot and wet with sweat and tears._

_Itachi's eyes are blank red, with no Sharingan to behold. His fingertips lightly touch my forehead. I cannot breathe._

_"Forgive me, Sasuke."_

_And then he presses his face into the crook of my neck, takes a deep breath, whispers: "This is the last time."_

_And then he smiles, slowly and sadly, as he draws back. One of his hands caresses my cheek, my jaw. _

_He transforms into a crow, gasping and writhing grotesquely. I raise a katana from the ground in curiosity. The crow squawks and flings itself into the bright blade._

Sasuke sat up in bed. He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes and found wetness there. It was the same dream as before, only … He found he could not quite grasp what had been different. Each recurrence was wearing on him. He scraped the tears off with the blade of his hand and flopped back onto his mattress.

He knew he would not get anymore sleep that night. It seemed that he rarely slept or ate at all, only trained. Walked. He decided to shower. It might clear his head. It probably would not. Bathing always seemed to do the opposite; the wash of water did no more cleansing than laying in bed.

xxx

Sasuke burst into Mizuki's office, acting on a whim. She looked up at him, glasses deposited on the paperwork in front of her. Her eyes were bloodshot and red-rimmed.

"Can you set up a meeting?"

"Yes. Of course." She called for her receptionist, set an appointment for tomorrow. "Is there anything you would like to talk about at the present?"

"I'm going insane."

The corner of her mouth lifted in a smirk. "I doubt that. You've been getting saner with every chat we have." Then she sighed. "I don't see a reason to keep you doing these sessions."

He shook his head. "No. A meeting with Itachi."

"What?"

"You said…awhile ago…that I needed to expose myself to what made me the way I am."

"Not quite like that. I see your point."

"What aren't you telling me?" He glared down at her.

"Itachi's in critical care. His chakra was almost completely depleted."

It felt like a switch had turned off in Sasuke's brain. He heard her explain what was happening, how his disease was stabilized. Eventually, she stopped talking and peered up at him with those bottomless eyes.

"You don't hate him."

"Explain something. About Itachi."

She gestured to the chair facing the desk. "Sit."

The Sharingan burned into her impassive black gaze. "I want to watch him die. The life leave his eyes. I can't stop thinking about it…but—" He covered his face with his hands. "I still have that dream. With the crow."

"Revenge isn't going to give you peace."

"Won't it?"

"What makes you so sure it will? I can't condone it or ban it, although the object of your revenge is currently in government custody." She seemed to remember to replace her glasses. Her eyes were hidden by the glare of the light. "Violence has never brought peace, no matter what your brother thinks."

"He spoke, in the dream," Sasuke said, after a long silence.

"What did he say?"

Sasuke's voice was slow and thick. "'Forgive me, Sasuke. This is the last time.'"

000

Lights. Flickering. Red, green, brilliant white. Then voices, muffled at first, but soon words could be plucked from the chaos, sentences. Soon followed touch and smell, the powdery latex caressing his arm before the sting of a needle, the smell of alcohol and vomit and excrement mixing to become the embodiment of uncleanliness.

It was only when he could feel his tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth that Itachi realized the underlying sourness was his own spit.

Something cold and plastic was occasionally pressed to his face, and he lost his senses. However, they always came back after the void, but he began to fill the void with visions, marvelous portraits of the Uchiha Compound at its finest. He saw the clan in its glory, a hundred pairs of Sharingan.

And he watched as his blade snuffed out each little red light, as if the blood flowing from their carotid arteries was part of a battery, serving to fuel the Sharingan. They all died with their precious bloodline reduced to lifeless red stones, the only light a reflection of the setting sun.

He was gentler with his mother, always gentler in these visions, casting a genjutsu before slashing her throat. Her blood splattered over his ANBU armor as he took the time to lay her on the wooden floor. Father, however, charged toward him while proclaiming his disappointment. The katana nearly severed his head, stopping just short of slicing through a cervical disc.

Then there were the bursts of cool healing chakra, bringing him out of the visions. He surfaced, truly surfaced, once and saw Tsunade bowed over him, healing the damage to his lungs while forcing his chakra pathways to stay open.

But the familiar drowsiness that accompanied the drugs pulled him below again.

The visions reflected more recent times now. Flashes of Tsukuyomi, of depleting his still-fledgling chakra resources by using the Sharingan constantly. The cold tiles burned into his skin, touched at his bones. His blood splattered onto its sterile whiteness.

Healing chakra was felt again, and he resurfaced to find a different woman, tall and robust, with icy blue eyes. She glanced at him, but did not pause in her work. Finally, she straightened her posture.

"I don't know why we are saving your life, Uchiha. You are stable. Don't use chakra for a few weeks." She spat his name out like venom. Her heels did not click along the floor; they clattered. Medic-nin. Heels likely reinforced with metal to be used as a weapon.

He lifted his left hand. There was an IV firmly taped to it. His veins stood out blue on the back of his hand. The Akatsuki ring was still in place; he had attempted to remove it several times in vain. Its jewel with the symbol seemed too bright for the room, a burning red. His hair was damp with sweat, hung heavily as he pushed himself to a sitting position.

A soft, chuffing laugh began, deep in his throat. Sasuke was a fool. He was a fool. Everybody, every last one of the people in the world, they were fools. The laugh erupted into bloody coughs. Maybe Sasuke could be made to see, before it was too late. Maybe Itachi would come out of it alive.


	15. And You're Not Here

AN: It was a blast (note: exquisite torture) to write this. I'm sorry if it's not what you expected, but it didn't turn out how I expected either.

Thanks everyone for you support and enjoyment, even if you did not feel like reviewing. Every alert and fave, every _hit _makes me giddy.

Chapter title comes from the song "Caught a Lite Sneeze" by Evans Blue. Any questions? I'll post an appendix later on, but I will immediately say that there is no need for a sequel, nor will I create one.

(PS – bring some tissues)

**Warning: Even though this fic is full of unpleasant things, I feel I should warn for Itachi's death. Just in case. **

**Mucho thanks to my beta. : )**

000

XV – And You're Not Here

000

Itachi was a disgusting, ugly creature. He could smell his sweat and illness, feel the filth he was wallowing in. The nurses and healers tended to him, bathed him. They reminded him of every wrong he had incurred.

You killed the innocent. You killed your parents. You tortured your brother. You tried to capture the nine-tails. You are in Akatsuki. You're a criminal. You should die. You should be dead.

"I should kill you myself."

At that, he chuckled dryly. "In time," he whispered.

Perhaps the blue-eyed woman heard, perhaps not. She simply said, in her usual flat tone, "Oh. It seems you have a visitor."

Mizuki and Sasuke, flanked by a four-man ANBU squad, entered the room. Mizuki turned and said something to the guards, and they withdrew from the room with a "yes, ma'am".

"Mizuki. Could you…give me some privacy?" Sasuke asked, glancing in Itachi's direction.

She raised one eyebrow but stepped out of the room, leaving the door open.

"I'm not here to kill you."

"Why not? You can strike me down at my most vulnerable, with any defense of mine rendered useless."

"You're going to die soon anyway."

Sasuke moved to the side of the bed. Itachi was too thin, cheekbones and clavicles jutting out like broken granite, the only sign of life being the eyes, the rise and fall of his chest. Those eyes seemed to burn through him. There was an emotion within them he could not quite fathom, and he did not try to.

"You don't have any weapons," Itachi said.

"No."

"A pity," Itachi sighed.

"They searched me before I was allowed in."

Itachi laughed then, a smug expression in place despite the cough that underscored the sound.

"You're pathetic."

"Why do you care? I am beneath you. I am brought down to Earth." The smirk turned into a sneer. "I am made mortal, tangible, no longer your idol. Isn't that what you want?" The sneer became a bitter shade of a smile.

"Don't you have a writ of execution with your name on it?"

Itachi's eyes darkened. "Perhaps."

"Why should I kill you, then?"

"You have already figured that out. Haven't you?

"It was easy, so easy," he murmured, shakily lifting his right hand, "simply took my katana and…" He let his hand drop to the bed limply.

Sasuke gave him a look of disgust, and turned to go. He was almost out the door when he heard, barely above a whisper:

"Please don't leave."

Sasuke glanced back, stopped walking. "Why?"

"Every waking moment. I … " He coughed. "I have thought of nothing but you."

Sasuke took a few steps toward the bed. "Was it worth it? Was _this_ worth it?" He surged forward and seized the front of Itachi's hospital gown. "Was this fucking worth it?"

One look of affirmation, quiet and confident, and then there was that strange emotion flitting through Itachi's dark eyes. His attire was let go of.

Itachi's hand reached up, slowly, and two of his fingers nudged Sasuke in the forehead. The corner of his mouth lifted in a sad, bitter smile.

_Sasuke was four. He had tripped over a cement step in the memorial area, and sprained his ankle and scraped his knees up. Before his mother realized, before anybody noticed, Itachi had scooped him up in his arms, only nine, and carried him home. Father was always more worried about Itachi, and that worried him; how could Itachi exert himself over him, such a small child?_

_But Itachi had smiled and said that he was not doing anything wrong, that he shouldn't worry his little head over what Father said so much. He had bandaged the scrapes and iced the ankle and kissed each injury to make it better just the way Mother did._

Sasuke understood what the unfathomable look was and took a step backward. The feeling of trepidation returned.

Itachi's hand remained suspended in the air for a fraction of a second before being snatched to his chest, like he had touched fire for that moment too long.

"I have wished to do that for a long time."

"You said, once," Sasuke began, "that you were an obstacle for me to overcome.

"How must I overcome you if you aren't even able to bathe yourself?" Sasuke leaned forward and placed a hand on the edge of the bed to steady himself. "Am I supposed to just…kill you? Is that what you want?"

Itachi simply looked up at him with those unfathomably dark eyes. He looked into the Sharingan. "Yes."

"Do you know what _I_ want?" His voice was soft, eyes obdurate. "I want to see you cold. Dead. I want to watch you die."

He paced around the room, gazing intently into Itachi's eyes in a show of intimidation, as a hawk circles the sky.

"Why not kill me, if that is what you want?" They gained a sharpness that belied his failing vision.

"Because you want me to." The pacing stopped. "I have spent my life being your challenger. There is no reason to stop."

"If I begged for my life, you would take it away." He wiped a thread of blood and spittle from the corner of his mouth. "I do not beg."

Sasuke activated Sharingan, then. He stood, arms loose at his sides, feet shoulder-breadth apart. And his face became stonier. "You're dying." He repeated it, weakly. "You're dying." He stepped forward, as if to confirm what the Sharingan told him. Barely enough chakra circulating to sustain his system as-is.

A grim smile alighted. "Now you are understanding."

Itachi's hand grasped Sasuke's and guided it to his throat. Sasuke could feel the pulse beneath his fingertips.

"Of course, the method remains entirely up to you. I would recommend the use of a blade. Failing that, breaking the trachea with your hand; it would be child's play, especially in my incapacitated state."

His hand trembled there, feeling the fluttering of Itachi's pulse beneath the cold flesh. An obstacle. That was what the prostrate man below had called himself long ago. An obstacle, nothing more. That was all, he told himself.

As if on cue, Itachi lifted his hand again. His fingers curled up, moved down Sasuke's face; his thumb wiped the tears that had begun to form.

"Don't worry." A sad smile crossed his face. "Your…big brother is here."

Sasuke's hand was exquisite heat on his neck. It lingered there, even as he could feel the rest of himself fading, slow but sure. He could sense Sasuke's indecision hanging in the air.

"You know what I have done. What I am capable of. Yet you hesitate."

Then, barely a breath of air: "Why?"

"I don't hate you," he said, clearly stunned by his answer. His hand did not move. "You're just an obstacle, aren't you?"

"You remember that."

Sasuke's grip became more firm. "You are an obstacle for me to overcome, you told me."

"If that is how you must rationalize it."

"You're my brother."

Itachi swallowed a cough, reveled in the warmth. Peace was on the horizon, a sunrise on the cusp of birth.

"My…idol."

"More than that, perhaps," Itachi rasped.

"I will reach above you."

"You did what I could not." Tendrils of darkness swam at the edges of Itachi's vision as Sasuke crushed his trachea. "You survived."

Sasuke summoned chakra to his fingertips. Itachi's face had become blurred in his vision, and he pawed the tears away. He needed to see. Needed to feel it as acutely as possible. If he missed out on a moment of the toppling of an idol, it would never satisfy his curiosity, desire. There would be no end to the torture.

Itachi's hand gently slid away, trailing lightly along his shoulder, down his chest, and came to rest on the bed. Even as his skin grew colder and paler, he smiled. Sasuke peered intently down at Itachi's face. Watching.

Waiting.

For a second, the glint, the spark disappeared from those dark eyes. And then the Sharingan went through each form of its evolution:

Red, one tomoe. Then two, then three.

A ragged cry issued from Itachi's throat as the mangekyo formed, as if even in death the memory of its creation had been imprinted into the body. The eyes bled, then. Just a few drops.

Sasuke jumped away as if burned.

The Sharingan was dull, lifeless.

_The idol was torn down, the obstacle clumb over. _

His lip trembled as he realized what he had done.

_The weight lifted. Peace achieved._

He staggered out of the room, stopping only when a too-familiar brown-haired girl shoved a piece of paper into his hand, and then stopping only when he could no longer thrust it from his mind.

He ran, hid in an alcove within a ramshackle alley, and slid down the brick wall to sit on a throne of dust and grass. A hand clamped itself firmly over his mouth as he tried not to cry out. An ache had settled into his chest, clawing its way up from his throat to burn at his tongue.

The brick behind him scraped at his arm as he curled up against it, unable to quash the shock. All he could see was the satisfied twist of Itachi's lip, the enlightened glimmer of his eye. Feel the brittle windpipe break like glass beneath his fingertips.

The first sob assaulted him, taking a sledgehammer to his carefully constructed walls. He could not bring himself to care anymore, if anyone saw him. By the time his horror had been drained from him, he was limp.

The once-forgotten paper was read with detached numbness, a letter from Itachi.

It was after Sasuke had fallen unconscious, after the letter had been blown away by a gust of wind, that Mizuki found him.

She paused with her hand lifted, prepared to shake him awake. Then she put her hands in her pockets and walked away.


	16. Appendix, Dissection, Dissertation

This is a chapter-by-chapter dissection of Dichotomy, by yours truly, sort of a behind-the-scenes look. I would suggest that if you don't want to reread it and have a lot of questions, this should help.

However, don't read this if you want to see how many twos you can put together or just want to find all the foreshadowing. Not that I've gone line-by-line to point everything out or anything.

Chapter One

Ah, yes, involuntary sperm donation (_classy_, right?). I think it makes perfect sense, since he is one of the last two known Uchiha, and Uchiha are powerful. I don't know how long it would take before the clan becomes viable again (which in itself is an interesting idea), but that's the reasoning behind it.

This also marks Satsuki's first appearance. I had actually intended her to be a one-off character, but…well…

Chapter Two

I was really struggling with Itachi's characterization the first few chapters, and it shows. Although, from a couple of scenes in the manga where Itachi knows Sasuke's location, it's not too much of a stretch to assume he keeps tabs on the guy, which is also why he delivers himself into Konoha.

Actually, this story could be classified as For Want of A Nail, the Nail being Sasuke's return.

The interrogation scene was more of the whole "he went willingly" thing. Ibiki doesn't have to do a lot because, well, Itachi doesn't need a whole lot of prompting. Yay, DRUGZ.

Naruto's the only source of humor for this fic. He's also not that good at putting things together, even in the manga (Kurenai had to spell out she was pregnant, so that's how I got that scene). I also figured, hey, Sasuke's suspended from going on missions, so why not have Sai?

And Mizuki's introduction. I'm glad she's been received pretty well by you guys. Originally I was going to have her be a little less snarky, but you can see how that worked out. Also, I like the idea of making Sasuke write things out but tossing it away later. Hahah.

Chapter Three

Even though I never really dealt with Orochimaru and Sasuke in-story, Mizuki and Sasuke do have sessions relating to it, which I hope was implied heavily enough to be picked up on.

Most of this chapter is really just showing off some of the research I've done. And I did a lot of research, even though I'm a hypochondriac. You're welcome. :P

And, yes, simply curing Itachi in one session and "detoxing", if you will, would create some nasty withdrawal symptoms because of the sudden absence of the drugs he's been taking since god-knows-when. Ever tried, say, abstaining from caffeine?

Chapter Four

Once again, just really sort of laying some groundwork. I know, it's kinda redundant to have PTSD mentioned so many times. And also, I pulled the Uchiha bros.' hobbies from an official source. Sasuke likes to take walks and train.

And I also took some time from our dashing male leads to shed a little light on Mizuki and have a cutesy moment with Itachi and Sasuke.

Chapter Five

I don't think I would be wrong in saying that Itachi never quite figures out who Mizuki is.

Ah, yes, and now the dreams start to have more sexual undertones. I thought I did a pretty good job of weaving it into them. Especially Sasuke's.

This also marks the first hint that Itachi wants to die, something I don't actually outright state in-prose until much later.

Crows are a major motif in Itachi's genjutsu, so I thought it was fitting that he change into one in Sasuke's dream.

Chapter Six

It's not readily apparent the first time, but we see Mizuki less and less primarily due to her promotion. She's a pencil-pusher, but can still hold her own in a fight despite the flashback. Genjutsu's her real forte.

I have a tumblr devoted to non-tegaki sketches. Just google valbinoffn and you should find it eventually; you can see Mizuki's original concept art there.

Mizuki got a bit too ambitious, and it sort of haunts her the rest of the fic for doing that to Sasuke.

And then we see Satsuki again, where I develop her character a little more, make her sympathetic. She's the closest thing to any sort of antagonizing force the story has, but not really an antagonist even with the loosest definition.

Chapter Seven

Mizuki being angsty. It's just a bit of an insight into her character, and part of her later emotional state.

And in this following scene, I felt like making them grapple because I can actually kind of describe grappling and not have it come out like shit. Anyway, I was also going to set up a more sexual relationship between the two than the story ends up being, but all the subtext makes it even more deliciously tragic, I think.

Ah, yes, the dream sequence. More Bro Yay in the guise of masochism, essentially, unused groundwork for the bromance.

Chapter Eight

Just a touch of humor at the beginning. There's very little in this fic, even for me.

The more important part, I think, is Itachi's little bit there. It's hard to articulate, but I tried to write it so that it's clear that either Itachi was planning on dying at the end of this anyway, or he didn't want to live. Which path I follow becomes more and more apparent.

And I also implied again that they are dealing with Orochimaru off-screen and all that.

Chapter Nine

I love writing Naruto and Sasuke being BROOOOOOOOOS. I am somewhat tempted to write a drabble or something about Naruto meeting Mizuki and just perving out on her, hahah.

And this is where I thought, hey, why _not_ use Satsuki again? It will look like I totally did it on purpose.

Then there's Sasuke being a badass ninja by clinging to the underside of a roof with pretty much no chakra.

Chapter Ten

Genjutsu is my most favorite thing to write in the world ever.

Anyway, if you aren't much for looking at my Fanfic Tegaki account, I've made Mizuki's ability total to be twenty-eight, so she's not quite as powerful as either Uchiha brother. Which is why her intervention might not be enough without Sasuke's trust or respect. Which is why I had to establish that Sasuke trusted/respected her early on.

The "I simply took my katana" line I think fits Itachi's projected aloofness quite well. It's kind of smarmy and smug.

This is also where I start to show, without ever really explicitly saying so, that Itachi's attempting to maneuver Sasuke into killing him (which eventually works, obviously). I mean, it's kind of Itachi's plan, but I also have to show him actively coercing Sasuke as well. Showing vs. Telling and all that.

And yes, the big reveal of the healer girl's name. I decided to reveal it in order to make her seem more…tangible as a character. A name gives something to grasp on to, turns an anonymous individual into a person.

Chapter Eleven

I had originally written the dream, but it's more effective to have Itachi tell you than to show you in this case. There are also other things that I think are more effective to imply rather than show, but that is a ramble for another day!

Savor the last iota of humor ever to be seen in Dichotomy! We will miss you!

I'm really still not that satisfied with the dialogue in the Tsukuyomi bit, here. It's just…blech. I don't know what else to do with it, though. Anyway, I just really like applying genjutsu to everything, and I wanted to fabricate some pieces of Itachi's background. I actually quite enjoy piecing together background information even if I never use it (I have a pretty in-depth one for

Chapter Twelve

There is a typo, which I need to fix as of 8-2-11, but that's not important.

Itachi's dreams have a sort of vague continuity to them, if you pay attention. The numerous stabbings in the chest are a reflection of the TB's pain and discomfort.

Hand-washing as symbolism is great. I couldn't make it any more obvious unless I told you directly, in the prose. Sputum is the guilt that he has built up over the years, the hand-washing is his failed attempt to forget (he can never get rid of it, and it will always appear. Think Lady Macbeth. Only a little grosser.)

The training montage originally had this gem: His movements were jerky and uncontrolled. Sometimes he let out a sob as he attacked the wooden pole, as if he was unaware that he had an audience.

So, uh, yeah. Phallic metaphor in the chapter itself…but toned down quite a bit. It's supposed to feel voyeuristic, still. It's supposed to make you uncomfortable.

I think it also makes sense for Sasuke to misinterpret his feelings as just hatred for Itachi. Actually, I culled his behavior from the "classic" symptoms of lovesickness. Loss of appetite, can't stop thinkin' 'bout choo, sleeplessness, etc. It also makes sense that he would confide in Sakura (though I really just wanted to use her for once) considering her connection to Tsunade.

Chapter Thirteen

GENJUTSU BATTLE!

Yeah, I love love love genjutsu. I've tried to make it kind of reminiscent of the in-manga battle. And more innuendo/Bro Yay.

And in the dream, the it and he is another heavy helping of Itachi dream continuity and Bro Yay as well.

And also, what I was trying to get across:

It is painless. _He._ (He is painless)

Chapter Fourteen

Yeah, I basically copypasted the dream from chapter five and added a few things onto it.

And more washing metaphors!

Yeah, Mizuki's pretty stressed out right now.

The last few paragraphs where Itachi's in-and-out of consciousness probably make up my favorite passage in the whole fic. Basically, the chakra suppressor did end up helping to kill him. He also was careless with what little chakra had been restored. To be honest, if I had made it so Itachi lived, I would have had his chakra severely stunted because of the suppressor.

Chapter Fifteen

There's really mostly just a lot of emotional back-and-forth in this chapter. I have a few scenes that would not have fit very well into this fic, but were pretty much my inspiration for the whole damn thing.

One in particular I think I will jot down here:

_Sasuke straddled Itachi's waist now, hands pressing into his shoulders. Itachi did not struggle. _

"_I should hate you," Sasuke muttered. _

_Then Itachi's hand, the one with the ring, hesitantly reached up and cradled his cheek. Sasuke recoiled at the touch, the gentleness of it. He closed his eyes. When the hand didn't go away, he started to lean into it. _

Well. That's part of it. You kind of get the idea.

Argh blargh I was so…distraught while writing the last third of the chapter. I ended up transplanting a few bits of dialogue and prose to different parts, but still. I made myself cry, aha. And, no, Sasuke doesn't die. He just cries himself to sleep.

I like the way I ended it. The letter was basically a confession of everything Itachi did and why he did it. Practically a love letter.


End file.
